Yours To Hold
by DarkElements10
Summary: From the first time they met and onwards there was something special about their relationship that they couldn't quiet explain. Collection of prompts found on Tumblr. Zack/OC.
1. 1: First Time They Met

**Yours To Hold**

 **By: Riley**

 **Summary** **– From the first time they met and onwards there was something special about their relationship that they couldn't quiet explain. Collection of prompts found on Tumblr.**

* * *

 **1: First Time They Met**

 **Age: 13**

* * *

The first time they met wasn't special at all.

As a matter of fact it was probably the worst way to ever meet someone. It shouldn't have been that tense. But it was. It shouldn't have had an underlying sense of fear. But it was.

However, it was something the two easily remembered when asked. As per usual, Zack had been gearing up to play some sort of prank on the hotel staff. What was a bored thirteen-year-old supposed to do when he lived in a hotel as extravagant as the Tipton? Respect it, as his mother always said?

Ha.

What a joke.

The Tipton crawled with opportunities for a good laugh; the air ducts were the perfect size, the elevators and stairwells could get them up and down to different floors within a matter of minutes, even the bell placed on the front desk to tell Mr. Moseby a new guest had arrived—with his office unfortunately misplaced behind it—was fodder for the mischief that ran through his head. He and Cody had even managed to make a prank out of the revolving doors that led into the Tipton hotel.

Those were always fun, but what was better was when new kids moved in. Not only did it make the veins in Mr. Moseby's throb like a volcano about to erupt, but it gave him something to do other than hang out with Cody all day. He loved his brother, but going over flashcards and math problems was not his idea of fun.

At thirteen years old many people around him—re: every person that had ever met him—had wished he would find some maturity and quench his thirst of causing mischief and destruction. No such luck. He had roped Cody into doing a prank on Mr. Moseby and had just stepped out of the elevator when he noticed the group standing at the front desk, conversing with the uptight hotel manager. The first thing he noticed was the brunette man that towered over the desk, making the hotel manager appear smaller than ever before, then he noticed the five kids that were with him as they glanced around the five star hotel with the same expression of awe on their faces he and Cody admittedly had when they first arrived from Seattle.

"Look." Cody nudged Zack on the arm and pointed over to the kids. He started to head over. "Let's go say 'hi'."

Zack wasn't interested—his mind had quickly shifted back to the stink bomb in his pocket that was waiting to be released—until the kids had all turned around and his eyes immediately zeroed in on the two girls. They ventured away from the desk while the three boys continued to stand near the man. Cody seemed to have noticed as well, for he had slowed his movements across the floor but his older brother grabbed onto his arm and continued to drag him.

"Hi!" Cody greeted them. He hadn't had planned on his greeting to come out so high pitched and squeaky, nor did he plan on saying anything at all but Zack had forced him forward and he stumbled to catch himself before crashing into them.

Nevertheless, the girls appeared a little annoyed as they took a step back.

As Cody righted himself Zack quickly noted that the girls were identical twins just as he and Cody were. Perfect. About his age. Didn't look like they were already over him. And very cute too. Two for the price of one. If not having a better chance all on his own.

"Hello ladies," he greeted them with a flirtatious lift to his voice.

"Hey," came the simple reply.

He studied their faces at the response, much as he did whenever he spoke to a girl. He was looking for the signs; a giggle, eyes lighting up, nervous shuffling, showing the same sort of confidence back to push forward his advances. This time, however, he got indifference. The girl wearing purple didn't say anything in response, merely looking him up and down, it was the one dressed in red that had replied.

The accent to her voice immediately caught his attention and intrigued him even further. Exotic. He liked that. With a smile he gave her a quick once-over noting the way her red sweatshirt stood out against her dark jeans, dark hair, and dark eyes. When she noticed he was staring at her, the corner of her mouth turned up into a smirk and wham. He was instantly smitten. This girl was definitely someone he could see himself with. Not to mention she didn't look like other girls he had known; blondes and brunette, the occasional redhead. No, her black hair and dark blue eyes that seemed to blaze with a mischievous fire instantly caught his attention. Not to mention the tattoo he could see coming from beneath the sleeve of her sweatshirt, so she was a bit of a rebel, that suited him just fine.

"Sooooo," he said to her, falling into a comfortable stance as he crossed his arms. "How does it feel to have just met the man of your dreams, sweet thang?" It was his go to line; the one that always got the best results.

Cody slapped himself on the forehead and tilted his head back to look at the ceiling.

The girl in purple made a snorting sound as she looked amused, finally smiling.

The girl in red copied his stance, crossing her arms over her chest as she tilted her head to the side. Her smirk widened, drawing Zack's eyes to her face once more. "I don't know, mate. But you'll be the first to know when I do, yeah?"

He smiled waned a little. Only a little. It was a small setback. His opening lines didn't work _all_ the time, but it was normal. There were plenty of other ways he could get her. Still, he was a little grateful that Cody spoke up next; at least he got her name. "Ignore him. I try to, anyway. I'm Cody and this is my brother, Zack."

"I'm Rhuben, this is my sister Riley" the girl in purple said. The small smile was still on her face.

"I couldn't help but notice your accent; it's not very common around here." Zack grimaced as Cody then started to ramble, his nervous habit with just about everything. "There are a lot of New York accents, and Southern accents, and some from the Midwest, some Jersey, and even some Irish here and there, but never from Australia. Australian accents are so cool, don't you think? Am I talking too much? Because when I'm nervous I have a habit of talking too—"

Reaching out, Zack slapped his hand over Cody's mouth, effectively cutting him off. Finally both girls smiled. "To answer your question, mate, we just got here from Australia," Rhuben explained. She turned and glanced at the man that continued to lean against the counter. "With our…Dad and our brothers; Patrick, Noah, and Sydney. Our Dad just got a job here in the States."

"What does he do?" Cody asked.

"He works in sales," Riley swiftly replied.

"And you moved into this hotel?" Cody's eyebrows flew down towards his eyes. "That's kind of expensive."

Zack slapped his hand to his forehead as Cody had done before. Didn't he realize how much of a blessing in disguise this was? Not only were there more kids at the Tipton hotel to hang out with, but now there was one girl for each of them and he didn't have to try and entertain them all himself. Not that he didn't have fun with it; it was almost a pastime to him, but he was getting older now. Focusing his attention on one girl was probably the better tactic.

"It was the only thing open to take us all in," Rhuben explained, her voice suddenly growing cold as if warning him to drop the subject. Even Zack felt it in the tips of his toes as if the temperature had dropped all around them.

Not wanting to lose the opportunity Zack made a show of running his hands through his hair and sauntered over to Riley, putting as much swag in his step as he could. He came to a stop beside her and she rolled her head towards him, following the movement with her body. The smile was gone but her expression was still pleasant. "So," he said and put his arm around her shoulders. "What do you say I give you the famous Zack tour of the hotel? The game room, the pool, the workout room…" he flashed her a flirtatious smile. "All the best places to make-out…"

"I'd appreciate it if you would take your hand off my daughter."

Riley's and Rhuben's eyes immediately darted to the floor.

The sound of the deep, almost gravely voice caused a chill to roll down Zack's spine, prickling every nerve and making every hair stand up along the way. He let out a light 'eep' his eyes instinctively shifting to Cody's, which grew to be the size of dinner plates, then slowly turned his head to look behind him. Tilting his head back to take in the man's full height of 6'4" Zack gulped when he noticed the steady steel grey eyes boring into him. Immediately dropping his arm, Zack slid back to Cody's side and grabbed onto him for protection.

"Thank you," the man said. He then turned away from Zack and Cody and focused on the girls. "We got our room; the bell boy is going to take our bags up." He nodded over to Esteban Ramirez, who stood behind them with a cart loaded down with suitcases. "Let's go." With a tilt of his head, he tightened his grip around the hand of the smallest boy with him and they headed towards the elevators.

Zack and Cody quickly moved out of the way of the passing group, watching as the girls lowered their heads and followed after him.

The tension that had immediately risen in the air around them had punched him in the stomach in a way he wasn't going to forget until he figured out the reason why.

And yet, he was still drawn to her.

* * *

 **A/N:** Well, that's the first one. The pieces aren't in any particular order; with that in mind their ages through this entire thing will jump between ages 13-22. If you'd like me to put a specific mention of how old they are, I'll do it in the chapter titles or figure something else out. I have about half of these written out already so I'm a little ahead of the curve for a while.

Other characters from the show as well as my OCs make appearances throughout this as well.

 **Cheers,**

 **-Riles**


	2. 2: On A Date

**2: On a date**

 **Age: 17**

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Zack didn't have a great track record with relationships.

Then again, he only had a few loves in his life; Maddie, the Red Sox, and money. But Maddie was too old for him and he realized they would be nothing but friends—she still owed him a dance at his prom, though. The Red Sox managed to crush him with a loss just as much as they made his heart soar with a win. And then there was money; he loved getting money, he hated spending it, but he was a sucker for material goods.

Then there was the dozens of girls he had dated for a day, a few hours, a week, a month, for what could've been a serious relationship but never got that far, all going through the alphabet from A to Z and the whole thing with Max was certainly a testament to that. Then again, they were sort of fated to not work out because of the way they started; based on a lie. She had kissed him at a basketball game due to the sheer excitement she felt over his winning shot, he was—in a way—forced to go out with her, started to like her when they were on their date, she found out he was 'taking one or the team', broke up with him, and they continued that little song and dance over the years.

All of those different relationships made him, admittedly, evade the idea of commitment. So how he managed to have Riley interested enough to date him was beyond him. But he wasn't complaining.

"What are you doing tonight?"

Riley smiled as her boyfriend turned away from his locker, obviously mentally scrolling through the things he was probably supposed to be doing that night—homework—and would not even touch. If the momentary panicked expression that rocketed across face was anything to go by. "Nothing," Zack finally replied as he closed his locker door and pressed his back against it before reaching out his hands and resting them on his waist, glad she was over the impulse to punch him whenever he so much as touched her. "Going out with you, I hope."

He flashed a charming smile, the one that always managed to make the cauldron of emotions she held to spill over, long before he was aware of the effect it has on her.

"Good answer," she replied with an even cheekier smile before grabbing onto the straps of her backpack. "Because I'm taking you somewhere." She reached out and lightly tapped him on the chest and he brought his hand up, wedging his fingers between hers.

His eyebrow rose though his smile didn't falter. "I don't get a choice?"

"Nope."

He thought for a moment. "Am I picking you up?"

"No."

"Am I driving?"

"No."

"Am I paying for it?"

"No."

His eyes lit up. "Sounds like my kind of date." He leaned in and gave her a peck, causing her smile to widen. "Where are we going?"

"It's a surprise."

Zack liked surprises, he could roll with that. He was a bit worried though. The smile on Riley's face meant the date could be just about anything. And the curiosity that settled into his gut wouldn't go away until later that night when he heard a knock at the door to his suite. He barely had the chance to say goodbye to his mother or brother—who continued to shake his head in disbelief that Zack and Riley were finally going out, considering how long he had been threatened to keep her feelings a secret—before she had pulled him out of the door and pushed him into the passenger seat of her car. She kept her word on that part of the date so that was a good sign.

His interest was piqued even further when he spotted boats out in the distance and realized that she had driven the two of them to the harbor. He glanced over at her as she pulled the car up to a stop, noticing her childlike giddiness—maybe nerves—as she clambered out of the car and hurried over to the passenger seat to pull him out again. He allowed himself to get dragged around to a dock until she slowed her steps, now anxious. His eyes widened when he spotted a mall picnic setup complete with lit candles.

"Wow, this is for me?" He asked her.

"Yep." Riley squeezed his hand, as if trying to let him know what she was saying without having to say it. "I know it's kinda cheesy—"

"—and not much like you at all," Zack broke in.

Making a show of sticking her nose in the air, his girlfriend crossed her arms over her chest and walked on without him. "Well, if you can't be appreciative of my hard work, boofhead, just say so, yeah?" She walked over to the picnic blanket and sat down Indian style. She pouted, the flickering flame in front of cast a shadow over her increasing the depth of her frown. "I try to be nice and make you a romantic dinner and you just complain."

Even in the dying light Zack could see the blush in her cheeks. She reached out and started to pick at the blanket in front of her. Zack walked over to her and pressed a kiss to the back of her head before stretching out on the blanket across from her. "Anyone that'll save my life from my mother's cooking is good in my books, Ley." Then again, _anything_ was better than his mother's cooking. "Thanks."

"You're welcome." She brightened a little as she sat up straight. "But you don't deserve it."

"Duly noted."

The rest of the evening went by in a flash—or else he had managed to fall into a food coma after having eaten so much shrimp, coleslaw, fries, and ice cream for dessert. Then they watched the illuminated boats coming into the harbor, waving to tourists that took the dinner cruise around. And they talked; about nothing and everything until they had nothing to talk about anymore and sat in comfortable silence his arms around her shoulders and gently playing with her hair, and she leaned against him, resting her head against his chest as she listened to his heartbeat.

She'd laugh evilly every time she would move her hand closer to a sensitive area on his body and she could hear his heartbeat quicken then slow as she removed her hand. Then he removed his hand from her hair and absentmindedly ran his fingers over hers, tapping the tips of hers in a sort of dance as he watched the silhouettes of the boats move further and away on the horizon.

Finally Riley packed everything up saying, "Better get you back before you turn into a Pumpkin, yeah?"

To which he replied by reaching his arm out and wrapping it around her waist, "Unlike Cinderella I've never actually made my curfew," and gave her a long kiss that left the two of them breathless and smiling like loons when it ended.

"D'you want to do this again next weekend?" She asked as they leisurely strolled back to the car. "I mean, I'm not sure if I'm a better date then Bob, but—" She laughed when Zack let out a loud cry of annoyance.

"I _never_ went on a date with Bob, alright?!"

"That's not what he's saying."

"He doesn't know what he's talking about," Zack insisted. "I only asked him to the nightclub so that he would help me get with Jolie."

"well, you must've done something right , boofhead, because he keeps saying you never called him back."

"Shut up."

Zack smiled warmly as Riley laughed again; he had a tendency to shy away from serious relationships, breaking them off before anyone got too attached. But this time around, he decided he may as well take the risk.

"To answer your question about going out against next weekend…you got it, Sweet Thang."


	3. 3: Doing Something Together

**3: Doing something together**

 **Age: 15**

* * *

"Will you bait my hook?"

"…You should be really careful the next time you ask someone that. You might not get the response you want."

Riley couldn't stop herself from laughing as Zack laughed and reached out his hand to take her fishing pole and the live worm that wriggled back and forth in the palm of her hand. She had no problem digging for and picking up worms, but splitting it in half just to catch a fish? Not happening. Which was strange in itself, she could surf in waters that were known for sharks but couldn't stand the idea of putting a sharp tip through the middle of a worm.

"I admit, I walked myself into that one," she said. "But you didn't need to take it that far."

"And worry people that I've actually gone insane? I don't think so." Zack rested her fishing pole against his chest, taking a step back so that he could take the worm and place it along the line. "You been fishing a lot?"

"Yeah, whenever we go to the lake to go wakeboarding we go finishing, too. What about you?"

"Mom sends Cody and I to our Aunt Martha's house down in Appletown every year." At the slight turn of Riley's head, he clarified. "It's a small town down in Texas; a _really_ small town. The moment someone does something, everyone knows."

"Oh, so it's like high school?"

"Yeah, but not enough hot girls around," Zack said honestly. He smiled and handed the fishing pole back to her. "It's got a lake, a lot of creeks, good for fishing and boating and using jet skis." He shrugged. "It can be pretty cool, but kind of lonely sometimes because everyone there knows that we live in such a swanky hotel and think _we think_ we're too good for them."

"I know what you mean." Riley looked over her shoulder before carefully throwing out the line of her fishing pole, dropping it into the water. "I get that when I'm back home sometimes. My friends are great, but there are some people around that are aggro and treat me differently."

"Before or after your parents died?"

Out of the corner of her eye Riley could see Zack quickly move his hand to cover his mouth and that annoyed her more than anything else. People always had something to say about it and she wished they would just come right out and say it instead of acting like she would crumble to pieces as soon as they were mentioned. Yes, it was still a tough subject to talk about, no she wouldn't be the one to bring it up unless she felt it was a good time to do it, but being treated differently for it always bothered her more than she could say.

"Don't apologize," she said, her eyes watching the water of the Charles River. "If you're going to ask you may as well mean it rather than acting like you haven't said anything at all." She rolled her shoulders. "And to answer your question, it was after. The only time it was a problem before was about different comps and games and stuff. But they were from different schools so that makes sense."

Zack made a humming sound and lowered himself down onto the bank, pressing his heels into the sand. He balanced his fishing pole loosely into his hand but didn't say anything else. He chewed his lower lip and looked around the clearing, waving to the passengers on the boat that sped by, shooting a gentle mist into the air.

"It's a good thing we're fifteen," he muttered as if it was an absentminded thought.

"Why's that?"

"If we were older we'd have to get a license to fish here."

Riley tried not to snort though she couldn't stop herself from shaking her head. She knew he was just using it as a way to change the subject. It was a nervous reaction many people had once they made the mistake of bringing up a touchy subject. "Not that that'd stop you," she said. "If I remember correctly, just last week you tried to pass yourself off as thirteen to get into that kid's party that was going on in the Tipton Game Room."

"Excuse me, but having a party where they have the classic arcade version of Kung Fu Slamma Jamma '99 that can only be played by the partygoers is a bit discriminatory don't you think?" His voice held a tone of vindictive determination.

"Do you even know what discriminatory means?" Riley sat down next to him. She stretched her feet out, digging her toes into the cool sand. "I mean, it's a pretty big word wouldn't want you to hurt yourself when you use it again, yeah?"

Zack waved a hand. "I've heard Cody use it a couple of times. Something about him being weak and puny in gym class, I dunno. I don't pay too much attention when he's talking."

Another laugh escaped Riley's mouth and Zack smiled. "So do you think we're actually going to catch any fish?"

"I don't know. But we have plenty of bait." Zack leaned over and looked at the bucket that sat between the two of them. His eyebrows rose as he looked further through the worms that continued to sit and wiggle and dance at the bottom. "Especially after we lost the first few to the ones that got away."

"Story of your life, then." Riley's eyes flashed as she twitched her eyebrows upwards. Zack made a face and reached over, shoving her fishing pole into the water. She scowled and got up to retrieve it, lifting it out of the water and reeled the line in until the hook came back completely empty. Behind her, she heard Zack laughing loudly and narrowed her eyes as she turned back towards him to find him stretched out along the sand, arms wrapped around his necks. "Mate, did you ask me to go fishing with you just so you could laugh at me?"

He managed to stop laughing long enough to wipe a tear from his eye. "And to check out your butt when you got up." He shielded his face as Riley knelt down and grabbed onto a handful of sand and threw it at him. "I was kidding!"

 _Liar,_ Riley thought. She didn't need to say it out loud; they both knew he wasn't kidding. "Don't let Max hear you say that," she warned him of her friend and his girlfriend.

"Max is fine, you don't have to worry about it. I invited you to come fishing with me, Riles, because you're my friend and I enjoy your company," he said honestly. "Besides, Cody gets girly about baiting worms than you do. And that's only when he's not boring me to death about the scientific names of each kind of fish and what makes them different from each other." He rolled his eyes before tightening his grip on his fishing pole, the front tipping towards the water. "Hey! I think I caught something!"

Riley walked closer to him and watched as Zack dug his heels into the sand and pulled back on the fishing pole, alternating between reeling in the line and pressing his weight into the sand. Riley continued to watch as he pulled the flopping fish closer and closer to shore. Finally, Zack walked into the water and grabbed the line, hoisting the fish out of the water. With a triumphant cry, he continued to hold it, turning towards his companion, who now stood with her arms crossed over her chest.

"Would you look at that?" He declared. "I managed to catch the first fish of the day _and_ it's the biggest thing I've ever seen."

Riley felt her temper flare, knowing a challenge when she heard it. Then she cleared her face until she held a pleasant expression. Anyone that knew her knew the look meant the other was headed for trouble, unfortunately Zack only knew her for a year. "I bet you want an up close look then?"

Before Zack could reply she reached out and shoved him on the shoulder, stiff-arming as she did so. The added pressure knocked Zack off his feet and he pitched over into the water of the river. He came up sputtering, spitting, and shaking his hair out of his face before glaring up at her.

Now Riley laughed.


	4. 4: Arguing (1)

**4: Arguing**

 **Age: 16**

* * *

Riley yawned, stretching her arms over her head. "Mate, I reckon that's all I can take for studying tonight. What do you say we take a break and finish up next arvo or something?"

Cody held up a finger, signaling for her to wait a minute, and then turned the page in his textbook, alternatively scribbling something into his notebook. Around him, Max, Tapeworm, Rhuben, and Crystal all started to pack up their own belongings knowing it wasn't going to make a difference; no matter if they stopped Cody was going to study until he felt he took in everything he needed. Not like he even needed to study in the first place.

 _God knows he has everything in the entire world memorized,_ Riley thought with a small smile, resting her chin on her crossed arms as they rested on the coffee table. _Too bad he can't figure out how make studying that much easier for the rest of us._ Catching her twin sister's eye she tried not to laugh at Cody's antics, starting to put up her own things. Behind her there was a light snore and she rolled her eyes. Of course Zack had been the only one to conk out about a half hour after they got started. Sure, Cody could be a bit overzealous with his studying schedule but it wasn't that bad.

"All we have left to study for tomorrow is American Literature and United States History," Tapeworm said, slinging his backpack over his shoulders. "Cody and I can handle United States History…if Zack ever wants to wake up." He tilted his head to his side, chuckling as Zack let out another snore. "Does he always snore that loud?"

Finally, Cody lifted his head and looked at his brother with disdain. "You have no idea," he said. "I keep trying to tell him that he has sleep apnea or something but you know Zack. He thought I was talking about some kind of food and then stopped listening when I tried to explain further." He reached out and poked his brother on the cheek with a pencil, laughing when Zack batted his hand away. "I've given up. You can try waving a brownie under his nose."

"Sorry." Crystal held the plastic-wrapped plate closer to her chest. "These are going home to Dad and the boys. You know they'll be mad if we didn't bring any back to them." She thought for a minute. "Especially Syd and Aaron…and my Dad…and Pat."

"Pat would probably sniff them out before you can even get through the door, cuz," Rhuben pointed out.

"Chances are he already knows that you have them, yeah?" Riley added. At another blast of Zack's snores she placed her hands on the front and back covers of her textbook and slammed her book shut, causing him to jerk awake.

Zack lowered his arm from behind his head, breathing deeply through his nose. Opening his eyes, he sat up, settling in the corner of the couch as his eyes darted around taking in the loose papers, notebooks, pens, pencils, and the textbook that lay open on his chest and his friends that were standing over him all with different expressions of amusement on their faces

"What?" He asked in a gruff voice, filled with sleep. Then he blinked and looked down at Riley, who sat cross legged on the floor, straightening her things. "We're done studying already?" He asked, rubbing at his eyes.

"You've been asleep for the past two hours," Riley replied, pulling her hair behind her ear. She leaned back against the couch, stretching her arms over her head as she did so. "So I'm not sure how much studying you managed to get done with your eyes closed."

"You'd be surprised how much I've managed to retain while asleep," Zack replied. He looked thoughtful. "Maybe I can invent something like that. You go to sleep and still learn."

"That's a little counterproductive don't you think?" Cody asked, nose wrinkling.

"Actually there's some basis in it," Tapeworm spoke up, eyes lighting up. His eyes shifted back and forth for a minute, as it always did when he started to get too far into his thoughts. "See there are some people that are auditory learners, and some that are visual learners. What about those that are neither? Or they don't prefer to be in a school setting. I think you have something there, Zack."

"Great!" Zack got to his feet, tugging down the bottom of his sweatshirt. "You invent it, I'll get the money for a patent and we'll split it 60/40."

"I should've known there was going to be some money involved," Max remarked, placing her hands on her hips. "But if you want to use his brain,"—she motioned towards Zack—"then it's gotta be an even split. 50/50."

"Or what?" Zack crossed his arms.

"Or she'll beat you up," Rhuben called out as Max raised an eyebrow and started to take long, deliberate strides towards him. Zack immediately moved behind Cody and grabbed onto his shoulders to use him as a human shield. He had been on the receiving end of one too many threats by Max to know she'd do it if she had the chance.

"Okay, okay, fine," Zack said. "50/50."

"Even though Max is probably going to end up with half of that anyway," Crystal teased. She laughed along with the others, brushing her hair behind her ear. "Well, we have to go. It's my turn to make dinner and these guys have been blowing up my phone for the last hour." She waved her phone for proof before heading towards the door.

Riley slid her books into her backpack and reached behind her to pull her pigtails free from the straps. She turned to Tapeworm, pressing her palms together, fingers outstretched. "Back to what you suggested before; you and the boys got history and we have English covered. At our place."

"You're just saying that because English is your best subject," Cody pointed out.

"No, I'm just saying that because that night is Rhu's turn to make dinner," she said and leaned out of the way as Rhuben went to slap her on the arm.

"Right. I'm ordering pizza," she declared.

Riley and her friends started laughing again. She brushed her red strand of hair out of her eyes and looked over at Zack as he sat back on the couch, lifting his cell phone up and looked through it. Twisting her mouth to the side and crossed her arms over her chest. "So are you going to help us next time or just sweet talk your way to an easy 'A'?"

"If getting an 'A' was so easy, I would have every female teacher wrapped around my finger, Sweet Thang," Zack replied, lowering his cell phone and smiling.

Normally Riley would have two distinct reactions towards Zack smiling at her. One of quick happiness and another of slight irritation. Irritation due to knowing that he probably still had feelings for Max whom he had broken up with earlier that year for her to go out with Tapeworm and was masking his own sadness by focusing his sights on her. And happiness because he was showing her positive attention, which would then turn to her own confusion, having pushed his feelings aside for so long. This time, however, she went straight to irritation. Here they were spending the entire night trying to study for some big tests coming up and he didn't do any work, fell asleep, and expected to skate by and find a way to get around studying.

Again.

Nothing made her frustrated more than seeing someone waste their own potential. Especially someone she cared about. They were close friends while they were constantly going in circles of who liked who when. Okay, so maybe her own reasons for not saying anything weren't some of the best, nor could she always rationalize them and maybe it made her a little crazy and…sort of irrational at times. And she knew keeping things bottled up for so long didn't help either. But it was true to be said that when she had something to say she wasn't afraid of saying it.

"So should we expect to see you in summer school again?" She asked. "The year's almost over and you're not making much progress, but now it looks like you're sitting at a C. You're acting like the losers in the back of the class that pretend to care and then blame the teacher for their failing grade."

"Ooh," Tapeworm said before he could stop himself, slapping his hand over his mouth.

"Oh boy," Rhuben and Max said at the same time, already knowing what was coming.

Cody immediately got to his feet and started to usher his friends towards the door with giant sweeping motions of his arms. "Hey, thanks for coming over and subjecting yourselves to my study plan. That was fun wasn't it? Let's do this again soon, alright?" He gently grabbed onto Riley's elbow and pulled her towards the door. "That was out of line," he muttered to her.

"What? It's true."

Zack pushed himself off the couch and slid his phone into his pocket. "That's hysterical, Riles," he said, crossing his arms. "Considering you were the same way when you first moved here. Or do you think that you're now better than everyone else that doesn't get as good grades?" His eyebrows twitched upwards.

Riley's eyes narrowed. That was a bit of a low blow. When she first moved to Boston school wasn't the top of her priorities compared to other important things. But since moving in with Crystal's father, Riley's Uncle Christian that had turned around. "I don't think I'm better than anyone else, but at least I'm trying to _make_ something of myself."

"Did you hear that?" Cody asked. "I think that was Mom. She said she was going to be home soon."

The two teens ignored him.

"Who needs to make something of themselves? Everyone's got to work for someone else," Zack pointed out. He placed a hand on his chest. "And the way I see it, the phrase 'choose a lazy person to do a hard job because they'll find an easy way to do it' is probably one of the smartest things ever said."

Riley threw her hands into the air. "Well, that's just your motto for life, isn't it?"

"Well at least I'm a good person. At least people like me because you're just mean."

That made Riley falter, made her eyebrows come together and nose wrinkle slightly. Of all of the things that managed to hurt her the most that made her the most insecure, being disliked was certainly one of them. But to be called mean…a jerk she could handle, she could admit she was a jerk sometimes but mean? "I'm not mean."

"You just called me a loser, Riley!" Zack shouted, face turning red from the effort. He moved his hands into his hair and let out an incredulous laugh. "You just called me a loser."

"I didn't call you a loser; I said you were _ac-ting_ -like-one!" Riley snapped back. "There's a difference."

"Like that matters," Zack said.

"Guys—"Crystal started then rolled her eyes when she was cut off and ignored.

"But you _are_! Every time it gets to a point you can do something for yourself you end up feeling sorry for yourself or comparing yourself to Cody. And when you do that you shut yourself down instead of doing something about your problems! It's like you want everyone around you to fix you and that can't happen if you don't want to do it for yourself."

"Fine. Whatever, Riley. Just get out!" Zack turned on his heel and walked away from her, going a few paces before he stopped and placed his hands on his hips. Maybe in case he would change his mind so that he'd be close enough to stop her.

If he wanted to.

"Fine." Her voice was just as cool but her resolve was quickly breaking. "Have fun failing like you always do." Sniffing, she flipped around and strode quickly out of the apartment, slamming the door behind her. She only made it halfway down the hallway, backing away so Esteban didn't run her over with a full luggage cart when she heard the door open and close behind her, causing her to turn around. "What?" She asked, seeing her friends looking at her.

"Really?" Max asked, tilting her head to the side. "I mean, I know you guys fight a lot but that was really…"

"Unnecessary," Crystal broke in.

Riley shrugged and turned away, wiping a tear off her cheek. "You think I don't already know that?" She asked. "Hey you know me and you just said it yourself. We fight a lot. Normally its fun but…" she trailed off, shaking her head.

Rhuben put her arm around her sister's shoulders. "It's alright, sis. It'll come good."

Riley nodded.

* * *

 **A/N:** I should probably also mention that at times this story does a UA (universe alteration) like _Save Me From Myself_ and _Help Me, Save Me_ has done so that SLOD characters are in the SLOZAC universe. I almost forgot to say that.

Thanks for reading.


	5. 5: Cuddling

**5: Cuddling**

 **Age: 20**

* * *

Zack yawned loudly as he finally made it back to his dorm room. If he knew his first year was going to be so hard he probably wouldn't have applied to go to NYU with Cody. Maybe he should've gone to a smaller school that wouldn't drain him so much. Then again Cody had been devastated he didn't get into Yale and after deciding to take a year off along with Zack he found his new calling to go to NYU. Zack, on the other hand, would've been fine staying in Miami working as a mechanic at a used car dealership but there was a bigger part of him that wanted to see what he was capable of doing.

But man if he knew pushing himself to go to classes was going to be so hard…Zack shook his head. _That was the point,_ he reminded himself. _If you stayed in Miami you might not have moved on from the car dealership and would've been stuck there._ Then he shrugged. _The money wasn't that bad, though._

Going into his single dorm room, Zack barely had a chance to make it over the threshold before he was hit from behind and flung onto his bed. Then he registered the arms wrapped around his waist and the laughter in his ear and smiled. "Okay, that one actually hurt," he commented, sliding his backpack to the floor and rolled over to greet his girlfriend with a kiss. "Were you following me?"

"No," Riley replied, brushing her hair back from her face. "I was down in Cody's and Woody's room and—"

"—you can hold your breath for that long?" Zack asked. "I mean, I'm known to be able to send out some noxious fumes every now and then, but with Woody it's like a bomb has gone off."

Riley rolled her eyes. "How romantic," she remarked dryly. "You sure do have a way with words, Zack."

"I try."

She swatted him on the arm. "I was hanging out in Cody's and Woody's room and realized it was about time for you to get back from class. Codes and Rhubes are waiting so we can go get something to eat. So? How was class?"

"Boring," Zack replied. He yawned again, running his hands over his face. "When am I ever going to need to know the basics of writing poetry and fiction? I'm not going to be a writer; I don't need all of that drilled into my head year after year after year."

"If it's going to help your writing, then yes you do," Riley pointed out.

"Again, I don't plan on being a writer, so it's pointless." He closed his eyes, resting his arms behind his head.

"That's a very narrow view of the world, don't you think?"

Now Zack opened an eye. "Coming from the girl that used to think everyone in the world was out to get her? Or that thought that every bad thing that could happen would happen to her? Or—"

"—I get the point," Riley broke in. She ran a hand through Zack's hair and rested her face close to his. Zack turned his head aside and the tip of his nose gently rubbed against Riley's. He then ducked his head and gave her another kiss, following his head turn with his body. Reaching out his hand, he gently rubbed her arm then pulled her flush against him, taking in her warmth against the New York chill that had settled into his bones. Zack shifted and moved closer to her kissing her forehead while pulling her further into him. She was warm and smelled of strawberries.

"I reckon class must've been bad," Riley murmured. "Normally you'd go straight to sleep."

"Normally I don't have someone to sleep with," Zack murmured in reply. Which was true; she was going back to Australia the next day so she could go back to her schooling. She and Rhuben had surprised him and Cody for the week, a week that had gone by faster than he anticipated.

Zack kissed her gently and opened his eyes to look into her blue ones; the same blue ones that had gone from freezing him with their icy glare to lighting up at every sight of him. Nothing made him happier than having the woman he loved in his arms, a dream he once thought was too far-off. She was compassionate, smart, beautiful, and mischievous wrapped up in a neat bow of warmth and confidence and he could rejuvenate that light for her when she was down on herself and those around her, waiting for the world to crash down on her shoulders, or for the other shoe to drop.

He found her touch addicting—even the punches and slaps to the back of his head, arms, and chest, her voice—thank God for that accent—soothing, and was continuously lost in her kisses to the point that he couldn't think straight when she did so. And as they continued to cuddle Zack's mind wandered to the future, what they would be doing after college. He never seriously thought of being married, but as each day passed the topic entered his head more frequently.

Zack smiled again, closing his eyes as he drifted off to sleep.

* * *

 **A/N:** Not all of the one-shots are going to be this short. But a good one for Valentine's Day, right? ;)


	6. 6: Their Song

**6: Their Song**

 **Age: 18**

* * *

"So you're telling me that every couple in the world _has_ to have 'their song'?" Riley used finger quotes around the words almost as if she didn't expect them to be real. As a matter of fact she was surprised Zack broach the topic first; she didn't think it was his thing.

Shrugging, Zack leaned against the table and picked up a French fry, popping it into his mouth. "I was just saying that Cody was going nuts over trying to figure out what his and Rhu's song was. I wasn't saying every couple needed one." He laughed lightly, shaking his head. "You should see how he's getting over it; he has a list of songs that he's thought of, in alphabetical order, and has categories such as release date, genre, and song meaning."

"Well, I can understand that," Riley said, dropping her right hand to her lap so she could use her left to eat her food. "Admittedly Cody can get severe tunnel vision over whatever it is that has his attention, but for something like this, it's harmless."

"Have you ever thought about it?" As quickly as Zack had asked the question, she was sure he was trying to catch her off-guard, if not watching her intently to see what her visceral reaction to the topic at hand was.

Riley thought about playing dumb for a minute but decided against it. One thing a lot of people didn't get about her judging by appearance and strong personality alone was that she was a romantic at heart. Since she was a young girl she had her wedding planned out—as well as eight year olds can—to the point that it didn't matter which groom was in the picture as long as she had one. She watched romance movies with constant eye rolls though deep down wondered what it would be like to have everything go perfectly in her life where a romance was just the icing on top of the cake. Despite everything she had been through, things that could have easily made her turn her back on the world; there was still a part of her heart dedicated to romantic gestures that made her smile and feel special.

"About us having a song?" She asked and when he nodded in clarification, she lowered her gaze to the burger and fries sitting on her plate. A frown captured her lips as she thought about it. "Sort of," she said honestly. "Not like, I'd be sitting in the car listening to the song and think it'd be a great song for us, but I've thought about it."

"Yeah, me too," Zack said. He continued to eat, his eyes shifting up from his plate and to her face. He wiped at his face, sniffing loudly, almost nervous. "I mean, Max and I had a song because it was the first time we had—"

"—danced together," Riley interrupted with a smile. "I remember." At his confused glance she laughed, leaning back against her side of the booth. "You remember that date that you two went on when you told her—"

"—Yeah, I think we get that story," Zack interrupted, blue eyes flashing with annoyance. "I think we all remember that, considering Max will never let me forget it." He held up a finger. "Technically that wasn't even my fault. Tapeworm and Cody were the ones that told me to do it. I don't know why everyone got mad at me and not them."

"Because you never tell someone that the only reason you're going out with them is because someone else told you to," Riley insisted. "As a matter of fact, I'm surprised that she still wanted to go out with you later."

Now a charming smile flittered across Zack's face and Riley rolled her eyes, knowing what was coming next. Nearly every time they referenced back to Zack and his ex-girlfriend's first date the conversation topic was turned to her. "So why are you going out with me?"

"I've already answered that question about ten times, Zack," she pointed out. "If you don't know it now then you're doomed to the mystery for the rest of your life. And besides, we're not talking about that. What I was going to say was the next basketball game you guys had was when you two got back on track and you were dancing to that song that day." She shook her head. "Plus, Max wouldn't stop talking about it later so it wasn't like the rest of us weren't going to find out."

"Yeah…with how big our group of friends are it's hard to keep a secret," Zack agreed. Riley's eyebrows rose and she tilted her head to the side. Then his eyes widened in innocence. "I was twelve, I liked girls but I didn't really know how to date one who was my friend. So I kept a lot of what was going on a secret."

"Aww, little Zack had more shame than game, yeah?" Riley teased.

Zack rolled his eyes, shaking his head.

Riley smiled and the two continued to eat in comfortable silence. Riley rested her chin in her hand, spinning her fork around her fingers as she thought about it. It didn't surprise her, really, to know that Zack and Max had had a song when she _really_ thought about it. The insecurities he hid through a player persona proved him to be a very romantic and sensitive person. But there had been many things he had gone through as well—his parent's divorce being the biggest one—that caused him to be afraid to open himself up to girls he dated. She thought he would be one that would immediately jump on the idea of having a song, he had surprised her with a lot of other romantic gestures before and since they started dating.

One Valentine's Day she remembered Zack and Cody brought in flowers for each of their girl friends and he had surprised her with a bigger bouquet of flowers inside her locker saying he thought she would like them. Riley had been more than surprised but extremely touched as well, wearing a massive grin on her face for the rest of her day. Another day he had surprised her with a date for dinner at the Tipton hotel—which was suspiciously quiet the night of—and had even dressed up for the occasion. Though other gestures of greeting her with a kiss every morning at school as well as having a habit of having to touch her in some way—whether it be his hand on her shoulder, holding her hand, his arm around her shoulders, or sat at her side, tapping her fingers with his.

Riley straightened her head and brushed her hair out of her eyes, giving her a good look at her boyfriend. She studied him; a face that was in between thin and round, short, wavy hair styled back in what resembled a 50s style haircut of which had started to darken as he got older, blue eyes, a thin mouth that continuously turned up into a mischievous smile through nearly every one of his mouths, a mole that sat by his mouth, the first thing she noticed that set him apart from Cody. (Of which her brothers, sister, and cousin would never stop teasing her about).

She teased him when his voice cracked and deepened into the one she liked to hear say her name, rolled her eyes whenever he looked for her attention no matter what he was doing but continuously found herself lost in his baby blues, and got angry whenever he messed with her to give her special attention when trying to cover up how flustered and special he made her feel. And to think she had tried to deny it for so long.

Finally, Zack looked up and his eyebrows furrowed when he found she was staring at him. "What?" He asked.

Shrugging, Riley brushed her cheek with her shoulder. "Nothing," she replied. "I was just thinking." Zack slightly shook his head, urging her to continue as he said, "you women think too much, but if it has to do with me, I'm all ears." Riley laughed. She liked that about him too, he made her laugh so easily. "I was just thinking if you _had_ to choose a song, which one would it be?"

He blinked for a moment and tilted his head to the side. Then his eyes narrowed and he sat up straight. She watched as his cheeks flushed lightly and said, "Do you know the Lifehouse song 'All In'?" It took Riley a second to remember but then she smiled and nodded. "Yeah, I can see that."

"Okay," Zack finished his plate and set it aside. "What about you?"

"I don't know," Riley said dismissively. She grinned as Zack made a sound of annoyance. "I don't know! I haven't thought about it too much."

"You know what you're problem is?" Zack pointed at her. "You're a tease. You've been doing this to me the entire we've known each other." As Riley tried to protest, laughing again, Zack continued. "That's okay, I've gotten used to it at this point. I should just be glad that you're dating me in the first place considering how long you made me wait."

She wasn't offended, knowing he was doing his best to continue making her laugh. That seemed to be his goal within their relationship to make her laugh as much as possible. "How long I _made_ you wait?"

"Yeah, our lives could've been so much easier if you weren't so stubborn to say that you liked me. If you said it sooner then I wouldn't have wasted my time with all of those other girls that meant nothing to me."

"Right, keep on thinking that, boofhead."

"I will, thank you."

Zack waited for Riley to finish her food before paying the check and the two left the restaurant. Zack slipped his arm around Riley's shoulders and she leaned into his side, looping her arm around his waist as they walked along the sidewalk. Riley's eyebrows furrowed together for a moment in thought. Something about what Zack had said founded familiar to her…what was it..? Oh. That was it. She suppressed a laugh, shaking her head.

He certainly was smarter than he gave himself credit for.

Riley pressed her hand into his side, grabbing Zack's attention and he looked down at her, eyebrows rising. Riley leaned up and he to him and he caught the hint, leaning down and the two exchanged a long kiss. "Not that I'm complaining, but what was that for?" The wind blew his hair from his eyes and she felt herself lost again.

"I've got an answer for you," she replied. "Of what song I thought we could have." Zack nodded, waiting for her to respond. Her smile widened. "Have you ever heard of a band called Skillet?"


	7. 7: Making Up (2)

**7: Making up**

 **Age: 16**

* * *

"So! What are we going to do about you and Zack?"

Riley lifted her gaze from her book and looked at her brother. He dropped down onto her bed and rested his chin in his hands, looking up at her. Before she could come up with a reply it was as if her family swarmed out of nowhere and soon Aaron, Crystal, Rhuben, Noah, and Sydney were all gathered on her bed as well. Judging by how quickly Crystal and Rhuben moved onto her bed, they had been waiting for the right time to broach the topic. Patrick being as blunt as he could be was obviously the sacrificial lamb.

"Who ever said _we_ were going to do something about me and Zack?" She asked.

"Come on, sis, you know the drill by now," Rhuben remarked with a raise of her eyebrow. She motioned to herself, her siblings, and her cousins. "If you're a Jackson you meddle in everyone else's love lives." She started to count off on her fingers. "Julius and Maddie, you and Zack—"

"—Rhu and Cody," Noah broke in. He paused and looked at Crystal who rolled her eyes as if to say 'get over it'. "Crys and Cody, Max and Tapeworm..."

"It's a family thing, Ri-bread," Patrick added. He reached out and tapped her on the knee. "And you're family. So we have to meddle in your business."

Crystal held up a finger. "Technically, I don't have to because I'm not a Jackson," she pointed out. "And neither is Aaron."

Sydney flipped over to give her a pointed look."Well if you come along on all of the crazy plans that we have to have fun—"

"—and potentially get thrown in jail," Aaron added. He twisted his mouth to the side and scratched the side of his neck. "Actually, that's more of Zack's plan. I mean, he's already gotten us into mall jail, real jail can't be too far off." He laughed as Crystal leaned over and ruffled his hair.

"—then you're part of the family and you're part of the meddling game." Sydney crossed his legs and slouched, his large sweatshirt making him appear about two times smaller than he usually did. "Don't act like you're above it."

"Oh yeah, our track record runs great, too," Patrick said sarcastically. He quickly changed the subject. "S, like I was saying, we're talking about you and Zack. What's going on with that? Why'd you get so mad at him?"

"When am I not mad at him for something, Pat?" Riley pointed out. She rolled her eyes, dog-earing the page she was reading and tossed it to the floor. Then she let out a frustrated sigh. She brought her knees to her chest and wrapped her arms around them. "I told you before, I'm mad because I'm tired of him always says he's not good enough at something as an excuse to not even try. At this rate he's going to be held back forever while we all go off to college or whatever we do."

" _Or_ you really like him," Crystal said. "There's that option too."

"Not everything I do around Zack has to go back to the fact that I like him." Riley paused for a second then slapped a hand over her mouth as her siblings and cousins all pointed at her and yelled 'a-ha' or 'I knew it' at the same time. She lowered her head, causing her hair to frame her face. She mentally slapped herself. "Please, it wasn't like it was such a secret."

"Then why do you keep denying it?"

"As I've said numerous times before, I have my reasons. Most of them having to do with myself. But that's not the point." She felt herself starting to get angry all over again. "The point is that I'm tired of caring about someone that doesn't even care about themselves."

"I hate to call you a hypocrite, Ri, but you've done the same thing," Noah pointed out. Riley blinked at him and he continued, "Zack's liked you pretty much since he looked at you, yeah?"

"I think we all know that, Noah," Crystal said.

He smiled. "I mean, when we first moved here you didn't really care what happened to you just as long as the rest of us were okay. And yet Zack liked you anyway. And helped you out. How come you can't do the same for him?"

Sheer stubbornness she could easily say. One thing Riley could certainly say about herself was that when she put her mind to something it was hard to change it. Much in the same vein that she hated to apologize unless she absolutely felt she needed to or that she was clearly wrong. Part of that she knew was because of the way she was raised; her mother and father telling her over and over that she should never allow anyone to make her decisions for her. The larger part she was sure was because of Robert and the effect he had on her after years of abuse and mistreatment. Then again she had surprised herself to find a bit of sympathy for Robert when it came to light that he had been stuck in a vicious cycle of abuse after his father had done the same to him.

It was different when she had to open herself up to someone else. She wasn't going to allow herself to ever be taken advantage of and that came out in harsher tones and judgments than she ever intended.

"Because my patience ran out a long time ago," Riley said flatly. She reached behind him and picked up a pillow, playfully throwing it into Sydney's face, knocking him backwards into Aaron. Sydney threw it back towards her but ended up hitting Rhuben in the face on accident. Dive rolling off the bed, Crystal hurried over to hers and picked up a pillow, whipping it back over and smacking Patrick to the floor.

Soon the seven were engulfed in an all-out pillow war. Once the excitement died down Riley quickly pulled on her shoes and grabbed her wallet, saying she would be back soon. Taking a large step over Patrick and Noah, who had somehow found a way to press each other's faces into the ground while wrestling, she left the room and started the short walk to the Tipton hotel. As she went in through the front door she found Cody leaving.

"Hey, Cody, how ya going?" She greeted him. " _Where_ are you going?" Then her eyes lowered to the book bag slung over his shoulder, threatening to knock him over. "Mmm, let me guess, the library right? You know, I think I should start paging you there, it'd be easier to reach you."

Cody smiled back at her. "There's nothing wrong with wanting to expand my mind and my interests through books I find at the library," he defended himself.

"It is when you're more of the librarian than the actual librarian is, yeah?"

"Wait until I'm the winner of the Nobel Prize and we'll see whose name doesn't make it to my acceptance speech." Cody nodded his head towards the elevators. "Zack's upstairs if you're looking for him. He just needed to get his backpack before we left."

"We?" Riley's eyebrows rose.

Cody shifted his backpack to his other shoulder. "Yeah, he's coming with me. Something you said must've gotten to him because he's willingly going this time. Though I can't agree with the way you spoke to him."

Riley sighed, tilting her head down. She knew the way she had yelled at him, suddenly showing her temper that she tried hard to quell wasn't good. And she knew there were times that she could be intimidating; Cody even saying right to her face that she scared him sometimes. That was certainly the last thing she wanted, to be seen as scary or intimidating, or…just plain unlikeable. Zack had hit the nail on the head, pinpointing her worst insecurity and fear of no one liking her. Most of the time she asked why any of the others were her friends considering how hard she tried to keep them away from her.

"I speak to a lot of people that way and I'm still surprised anyone is my friend," She admitted.

"That's because you show this side of you," Cody pointed out. "And when you're with your brothers or other kids you're really gentle with them. Everyone says I'm sensitive, Ri, but I think you're more sensitive than anyone knows."

"It's funny, I think my mum said the same thing before," Riley pointed out. She smiled a little, crossing her arms. "Then again I did punch someone after beating me at a game of cards. He kind of deserved it, though. The boofhead was a terrible winner." She reached out and gave Cody a hug. "Thanks for letting me know I was starting to be a jerk."

" _Starting?"_ Cody repeated. "I don't know what it is, but whenever you're around Zack you have the tendency to let him get to you."

"Yeah, well, Noah really pointed out to me what my problem is and I hate to admit that you were right but you were." She could tell from the smile worming its way onto Cody's face he knew what she was referring to. "Just like always. I'm going to head upstairs, okay? I'll send Zack down so you two can go the library. A piece of advice though, chain him to the table. God knows his attention is going to go flying out the window within the first few seconds."

"Luckily for me Zack never seems to bring me entertainment in forcing him to study. It helps me be creative in the knots I learned in Boy Scouts as well as different forms of torture I've learned from reading history books."

For a second Riley thought about asking if he was telling the truth but realized it was probably better that she didn't know. Cody's smarts could be very scary at times, especially when it was quite possible he would be the next one to develop and destroy the next big disease or nuclear warhead. Instead, she waved to Cody and headed up to the boys' suite, running into Zack just as he stepped out the door.

Zack paused as he locked the door. He reached up and pushed the hood of his sweatshirt off his forehead. "What are you doing here? Don't you have someone else to yell at?" He slid his backpack over his shoulder but didn't move to leave.

 _That has to be a good sign,_ Riley thought, leaning against the wall next to her. She looked him in the eye as she said, "Come on, Zack, you know I'm always going to help you no matter how mad I am at you. My mouth has a habit of running before my brain and I don't always catch it. I didn't say what I meant."

"Yeah, but you always mean what you say. And, I'm sorry; shouldn't I be the one that's mad at you?"

"You _should_ ," Riley agreed. But then she studied him for a moment, taking in his body language and the way he was looking at her. Her lips pulled back into a light smirk, eyebrow twitching upwards."But you're not."

"Congratulations, you're right about something else." Finally, Zack took his hand off the door and started down the hallway.

"What's that supposed to mean?"

Sighing heavily, Zack turned to face her once more. "It means that you were right. I don't try really hard and I waste my potential. You can only have so many people say it to you until it sinks in and I guess you saying it was that time. And I was starting to get _really_ tired of Cody constantly flaunting his grades in my face. I swear it's only a few more times before I take his latest grade and shove it down his throat." Zack rolled his eyes. "Though knowing Cody he'll just use it as a way to find the nutritional value in a piece of paper."

"That's Cody for you," Riley agreed. "Anyway, I came over here to apologize."

"You don't have to."

"I kind of, do. I talked to my brothers and sister and Crys and Aaron…" Riley trailed off for a second. "And Max and Tapeworm and I know I was wrong." Max had practically cornered her at school the day after she and Zack had fought, telling her she shouldn't waste the time they had left in high school arguing over something that Zack needed to figure out for himself. Max had even said she and Zack had argued over it when they were going out, It seemed that everyone in Zack's life tried to show him he needed to work harder. She just said it the loudest.

"I know, Tapeworm talked to me, too, I can handle it when he's saying it, with Cody he comes up with facts and figures and charts and makes a huge presentation out of it." Zack said. "Besides, if anything I should apologize to you. For what I said."

"Please, I've heard a lot worse things from worse people. It's not a big deal. I was never really upset about it anyway." That was a lie. A big lie. One she hoped she never had to fess up to. She prided herself on being someone that didn't care so much about what other people thought but found herself caring too much at the most inopportune times. "Besides, what you decide to do with your life is none of my business."

Zack smiled. "Unless you make it your business. You care too much about everyone else to even think what you just said is the truth."

She shrugged then crossed her arms. "So…are we cool?"

"I don't know…you _did_ call me a loser."

"I've called you worse than that. I've even said you were dead to me on more than one occasion." Riley thought for a moment. "Then again that was back when I didn't want _anyone_ around me. So congratulations on your resurrection, yeah?" She was silent for a moment. "You're not a loser, Zack."

"Okay!" Now Zack dropped his backpack to the floor and crossed his arms. "Why are you being so nice to me? That's worse than you yelling at the top of your lungs at me. At least when you're yelling I can tell it's because you care."

Riley laughed. "Oh. So you _want_ me to yell at you?"

"I don't think you've noticed, but it's a pretty big turn on for me," Zack teased. "Girls falling all over me? That's so boring compared to having someone who uses that much time and attention to at least yell. And something about a girl screaming my name at the-"

"—I get it," Riley interrupted, raising her hand to silence him. "I really walked myself into that one."

"You just make it too easy, Ri." Zack shuffled his feet. "Let's just agree to disagree. You don't have to apologize to me and I don't have to apologize to you. But I _do_ have to ask you a favor?"

"No, I'm not going to help you ship Cody off to Antarctica."

"No, not that. I'm still trying to figure out how I can stick him into a big enough box without him realizing what I'm doing." An embarrassed look came over Zack's face and he shuffled his feet. "English is my worst subject and I know you're good at it. I was hoping you could help me with the paper we have assigned."

Riley felt her eyes widen. "Zack, that's due tomorrow!"

He gave her an incredulous. "I never said I was good at doing things on time, just that I need help. And right now I'd take as much help as I can get as long as it's not from Cody."

"You really have to get over thing with Cody."

"After he tried to smother me when we were babies? I don't think so."


	8. 8: The Morning After

**8: The Morning After**

 **Age: 18**

* * *

Zack rubbed his eyes as they blinked open. He expected to awaken with his face pressed into the dark tresses of his girlfriend's hair, arms wrapped protectively around her, sharing her body heat.

Instead e looked up at the ceiling that hung over him and frowned. Right. He wasn't at the Tipton hotel. He wasn't at his father's apartment. He and his friends were on their senior class trip. A full weekend of the surf and sand with limited viewing by the chaperones; what else could they want? He and his friends were about to graduate within the next few weeks, by that point they didn't need to be watched like hawks.

And as far as Zack was concerned, his suggestion of going to Nantucket was one of the smartest ideas he'd ever had. Not only was it a good vacation spot, but it was close enough to Boston that their parents didn't have to worry. Making it a trip for everyone made it that much easier to convince everyone. Getting Miss. Tutweiller and Mr. Moseby to agree to be a chaperone was easy as well; the mention of a romantic getaway quickly grabbed their attention. (Or the blackmail was, as far as Zack was concerned. There were always good things to be found out by crawling through the Tipton air vents so much). Then Zack mentioned they would be chaperoning while on said vacation. By that point it was too late for them to change her mind.

Since arriving at Nantucket everyone had been having a blast but it was the night before that was fresh on his mind as he woke up. Zack ran a hand over his face once more and took in a deep breath through his nose. His heart raced with apprehension and wonder. Were things supposed to be different now? Would they fall apart or continue to get better?

Hearing a rustling sound to his right, Zack rolled over and rested his cheek on his arm as he watched Riley pull a shirt over her head, now fully dressed. Once it was settled into place she stood up and jammed her feet into her shoes.

Zack watched her quietly move around before saying," Trying to run out on me already?"

Riley turned to him, loose ponytail falling over her shoulder and smiled gently at him, eyebrows twitching upwards. "Kind of have to get back to my room before Miss. Tutweiller comes checking on us, yeah?"

A snort escaped Zack's lips. "Do you _really_ think she's going to be checking? _Or_ Mr. Moseby for that matter? I don't know if you remember, but those two avoid me like the plague."

Riley thought for a moment. "Considering someone, I'm not going to name names, convinced them into thinking they were going on a vacation figured out they were lied to?"

 _And blackmailed,_ Zack thought. But he was smart enough to know it wasn't a good idea to bring up that interesting tidbit of information.

"I don't think she's going to let too much slip by, boofhead." She leaned over and gave him a quick peck.

Zack closed his eyes against the fruity smell that suddenly enveloped him; citrusy sweet with hints of vanilla. Then he opened his eyes one more, looking up at her in confusion. "Did you take a shower?" He must've been a heavier sleeper than he thought if she managed to slip away to take a shower before almost making it out the door.

"Yeah, I kind of had to," Riley said. "Couldn't go back to my room smelling like you. That'd just bring up too many questions."

"You don't like the way I smell?"

"You smell faintly like lunchmeat, mate. As much as I like to eat it on my sandwiches, I'm not to keep about it being an actual smell." Riley shrugged. "It's better than the way you smelled _before_ you started to pay more attention to your hygiene. It's a wonder you were able to get any dates at all. Let alone with me, yeah?" She turned on her heel and started towards the door to his room.

"Wait." Zack sat up, being careful to keep the sheets over his lower half. "I'm sorry."

Riley's eyebrows furrowed together. She turned back to him, crossing her arms over her chest. "Sorry?" She repeated. He could hear a slight tinge of worry in her voice and mentally slapped himself. He didn't want her to worry. "For what?"

"For whatever it is I did that made you suddenly start to contemplate all of the decisions you've made in your life up until last night." He gave a soft smile to show he was joking and she smiled back, gently shaking her head. "And for whatever it was we were fighting about because I really don't remember."

"That's a hangover for you."

"I didn't drink, though."

Chuckling, Riley reached out and ruffled Zack's hair. "Not the kind of hangover I meant, dum-dum."

Zack sighed in relief. Nothing had changed; they were still able to act the way they always had before. She was still able to tease him in the way he loved and didn't ever feel offended by. It was the way she showed her affection for him as she had explained to him; a way to show the attention she would otherwise be open to if she weren't so afraid. The same way Zack messed with her, effortlessly walking her into declarations of her feelings for him and teasing her 'til she was flustered.

Riley lowered her hand to his cheek and gently rubbed her thumb against his cheek. "I don't remember anything about our fight either, but right now I don't think that matters."

Reaching up, Zack took her hand in his and brought it to his lap. He rubbed his thumb over the back of her hand and looked her in the eye. It was as if he was looking at her for the first time. Looking through the tough walls, through the scars, through the demeanor she put up of anyone that came too close to her. The same things he had managed to break down, to break through the night before when he held her close to him, whispering everything she had ever wanted to hear and being sincere about it all. Just by looking at her he could see she was looking at him the same way. And he felt good.

Better than good. Great. Ecstatic.

He knew then she truly did see him for who he was and that she loved him very much. She had whispered that to him, too and while he felt his heart explode with joy each time she did, he still held a tiny inkling of doubt. Now he knew how true it was.

"I love you, you know," he said, tightening his grip on her hand. "I know I said that a lot, for a long time. But I was a kid and thought infatuation was the same thing as love. But I really do love you, Ley."

Riley smiled the widest smile Zack had ever seen on her. Her eyes lit up, causing the dark blue shade to lighten as well. He could see all of her walls finally and completely break away from her. She squeezed his hand back and leaned in, giving him a long kiss. She then kissed his cheek before lowering her head and resting her forehead against his shoulder. "I love you, too, Z," she murmured. Sitting back she framed his face with her hands. "I love you, too."

It wasn't the first time they said the words to each other, not even the first time where it really mattered. But the first time they understood the complete meaning of the words. He could meet his biggest celebrity crushes or be set up with some of the hottest supermodels in the world and he wouldn't give them a second glance. (Okay, maybe not a _third_ one).

Zack smiled again and ran his hand over her hair, playing with the ends, letting them slide between his fingers. Then he climbed out of bed and hastily pulled on his discarded boxers and jeans before walking his girlfriend to the door. He gave her another kiss before allowing her to slip out of the room.

"Was that Riley I just saw?"

Zack turned from the door and noticed Cody standing in the kitchen area of their hotel room, standing by a coffee pot. He picked up a steaming mug and placed it to his mouth, taking a sip. Zack gave him a look, walking over to him.

"Since when do you drink coffee?" He asked, leaning against one side of the counter. Cody set his mug aside and mimicked his brother's stance.

"It's not coffee, its tea," he explained. "A good way to wake up in the morning without the use of stimulants, caffeine…Red Bull." Zack rolled his eyes and Cody shook his head, flicking his hair form his face. "Don't try to change the subject. You didn't answer my question."

"As far as we're concerned, that could've been Rhu or Crys," Zack pointed out.

Cody gave Zack a 'duh' look. "Considering how late Moose stays up awake as well as how early he wakes up because he was so used to it, growing up on a farm, I doubt its Moose. Max and Tapeworm have their own room—which I'm not even going to go into questioning their parents' decision about that—and he sleeps in longer than you do. Plus, there are many ways you've managed to turn blame onto me in extenuating circumstances but it won't work this time."

Zack blinked blankly at him. "Yeah, I just heard a lot of words going by and you going 'blah, blah, blah'." He opened his closed his hand as if it were a mouth, causing Cody to roll his eyes. "So I pretty much stopped paying attention when you started talking."

Licking his lips, Cody looked away from his brother for a moment. Then he looked back at him once more. "Okay, let me ask in a question that even you can understand…" His gaze softened and he looked apprehensive for a moment. "Without going into any details because I _don't_ want any mental pictures; did you…?" He purposefully trailed off.

"I've had enough experience to know girls don't like it when you brag about this sort of thing," Zack pointed out. "Though I'm not bragging about it." Cody's eyebrows rose. "Not with _her_ , I mean. I was young and stupid before."

"I buy the young part," Cody remarked. "You're not stupid, Zack. You just didn't always think before you did something. So, I guess that answers my question. Are you okay?"

 _Am I okay about what?_ Zack thought. It was a strange question to be asked. He had heard 'how good was she in bed', 'is she as much of a freak as she acts', and 'how many times' of the other girls he had slept with. But Cody's question really threw him off. "Why wouldn't I be okay?"

"Because sleeping with someone is a very emotional thing, just as much for the guy as the girl. And considering I know how you two feel about each other, and because you're my twin let alone my brother, I wanted to make sure you were okay. I'm sure you're agonizing over whether or not things are going to change between you now. Especially with what's going on with school…"

Zack shook his head. "What about you? How'd you and Rhu deal with it?"

Cody thought for a moment. "Talking about it. Being open. Making sure we knew where each other stood and that we were having problems coping if we were. Communication is key." He reached out and placed his hand on Zack's bare shoulder. "Though I know that's always been a bit of a difficulty for you. You don't know enough basic grammar for me _not_ to worry."

"Ha ha." Zack pushed Cody's hand off his shoulder. "At least I talk about something interesting other than stock reports, the government, and what new scientific discovery has just happened."

"And when I go to visit you in jail I'll know what _not_ to talk to you about." Cody smirked before peering at him closely. "But seriously, are you okay?"

Zack thought for a moment. He was on vacation, he was with his best friends, he had a girlfriend he loved very much, and he had a good job waiting for him back in Miami that was treating him well. What was there to complain about?

"I'm great," he replied.


	9. 9: Kissing

**9: Kissing**

 **Age: 13-17**

* * *

When asked what their first kiss was like, it's inevitable that Zack and Riley would look at each other for a moment before simultaneously asking 'which one?'

Not only is a kiss not just a kiss, as many people tried to play it off, it was something that had any emotions in different forms attached.

In terms of the first kiss there were many more factors that came into play; was it the person's legitimate first kiss? If so there were bound to be messy feelings attached; sweaty hand-shaking, anxiety inducing emotions that melted away as soon as it happened. Maybe a first kiss at the end of a date between a new couple that had mutually agreed they wanted to see each other again that brought on the wobbly knees and clumsy meeting of their lips. Or was it the first kiss between a couple that had been friends first? Those feelings were bright and happy; giggle inducing, rosy cheeks of exhilaration, warm butterflies in the stomach of a relationship growing stronger.

For Zack and Riley, their history of kissing wasn't as normal as other couples that ended up so in love with each other. As a matter of fact, Zack found himself slapped, beaten, or glared at in some faction after most of them, though not all of them were so bad.

Their first kiss had been Zack's overzealous attraction to her and misreading of signals. This was before they were even friends. Not that it was romantic anyway; being kissed in the dingy basement of the Tipton Hotel isn't something many people would _want_ to remember. And not that he knew it at the time, but Riley had reacted so badly to it—earning him a hard shove against the chest and a slap to the face, or was it a punch? All he remembered was his eye was swollen for days—simply due to the fact that she knew her foster father at the time wouldn't allow her to have friends let alone a boyfriend. Her knee-jerk reaction to the idea of anyone coming too close to her and potentially getting hurt because of it.

The first time he kissed her that resulted in him getting slapped—that he actually did remember—was on their mad chase around the Tipton Hotel for "Hot Peppers" DeLeo's treasure. In his madness for the money, he daydreamed about her falling for him after having found all of the money that was supposedly stashed within the hotel. She had immediately pushed him off her with words of disgust falling from her lips. Another knee-jerk reaction fueled by fear, but also because she had been caught so off-guard.

Then there was a kiss that didn't actually happen but technically did when they shared Mr. Moseby's drinking hat at the Red Sox-Yankees game he took them, Cody, and Rhuben too. It didn't _really_ count but for all the 'rules' teenagers had about kissing it may as well have been a real thing; they did technically swap spit.

Zack thought it counted; he bragged about it enough.

The first one when they were friends had been because of a kissing game during a party in middle school; spin the bottle to be exact. That was the one the two of them remembered the most and would probably be the one quickly thought of in response to the question of a 'first kiss'. It was the one that had Riley realize that she truly did feel more for him than she had before, that their friendship had grown. The realization alone made her a distant, there were still things she had been dealing with that kept her from expressing her feelings. Zack always had hope and was glad they were at least friends. Frustrated, but glad.

Growing closer still had strengthened their friendship with each other, with little kisses here and there. The first time _she_ kissed _him_ had been under the mistletoe during Christmas through his strategic placing of it in the Tipton hotel. That was one present he got and he didn't have to ask Santa for it.

The first time she kissed his cheek was when he graduated from summer school—of course after having given him a hard time about his plan to hide his lack of graduating in the first place.

The first time he kissed her hand had been at the homecoming dance freshmen year. They hadn't gone as dates; they and their friends had gone in a big group, he was dating Max at the time, and yeah he had done it to all of the other girls (Max, Rhuben, Crystal, Bailey), but there was something special about the way he looked at her afterwards that made her feel flustered and a little guilty. The last thing she wanted to be was someone who broke up someone else's relationship.

The first time she kissed his forehead had been when he expressed his doubts about being a good enough student to graduate from high school which was clearly something that had worried him longer than he allowed his friends and family to know. And she had listened to everything he had to say; every bad word against himself, every worry, every self-deprecating jab, every hate filled word of whether or not he was going to amount to much. Then she had taken his face in her hands, to be sure he would listen to what she had to say, and told him he was much more than he thought of himself. That while school may not be his strong point there were plenty of other things he was good at and he shouldn't think school was the end-all be-all showcase of success. Then she pressed a gentle kiss to his forehead and said she was proud of him for getting that far despite his worries. A move that was usually reserved for her brothers; it said a lot that she bestowed it upon him.

The first time he kissed her head had been when she and her siblings received the news their grandfather back in Australia had suffered from a heart attack. She had stayed stoic about it for as long as she could, before finally breaking down in the middle of study hall. She had quickly gotten a hall pass and left the room and Zack immediately followed her, catching up to her in the hallway and giving her a wordless hug. She wrapped her arms around him and cried while Zack rubbed her back. He kissed the side of her head to let her know he was there to talk if she needed to.

Nothing else had to be said.

The first time they kissed, the first _real_ kiss had been after going to a Red Sox game together. Mr. Moseby had gotten the tickets for a guest who ended up not being able to make it to the hotel and had given it to Zack to keep him out of trouble for at least one night. She was the first one he had thought to ask to go with him as, in his words, "Cody can find a way to make everything boring". And they had a great time at the game where the Red Sox managed to narrowly avoid a sound defeat by the Mariners with a series of comeback homers within the last few innings, while eating nothing but hot dogs, cotton candy, and ice cream.

Zack dropped her off at the Manning house and had walked her up to the door when she had said something about, "getting it out of the way."

"Getting what out of the way?" Zack asked her. He was confused on two fronts; one being that he wasn't too sure what she had said as she sort of mumbled it to her feet, and two if he had heard her correctly he didn't understand what she meant.

But he got the message loud and clear when she placed a hand on the back of his neck and swooped in to plant a long kiss on his lips. He had been surprised at first, thinking it would have to be him to make the first move, before returning the kiss, the two grinning at each other when they broke apart, mutually understanding the upgrade to their relationship.

And since then their relationship had been filled with different kisses: kisses of greeting, kisses to say goodbye, just because kisses, kisses on the cheek—or in Riley's case, due to their height difference, under his jaw-pecks between classes, kisses on the hand, kisses on the head, kisses to show they cared. Passionate, tender, gentle, romantic, butterfly inducing, kisses to mess with their friends, and kisses just for themselves.

With all of those tender moments within their relationship it made sense for them to have different ideas of what their first kiss was, though none was more important than the other.


	10. 10: Cloud Watching-Stargazing

**10: Cloud watching/Stargazing**

 **Age: 17**

* * *

"Zack. Zack! Are you listening to me?"

Zack blinked twice then looked up at his brother with an expression of complete boredom. "I haven't listened to a word you've said since we were three, all you do is talk, talk, talk, talk, talk, talk, talk…" he opened and closed his hand as if it were talking. Then he lowered his hand and shook his head. "What were we talking about again?"

Cody and Tapeworm exchanged a glance before Cody sighed heavily, crossing his arms. Tapeworm, who was a bit more patient with Zack, then explained, "We were talking about the astronomy club," he explained.

"And I'd care about that because?" Zack looked up as the school bell rang, signaling the end of the school day. He gathered his things together and slid them into his backpack. Then he wrinkled his nose. "You're telling me that you spend your free period at the end of the day on stupid things like astronomy club?"

Cody and Tapeworm fell into step beside him as the three left the study hall. "Yes!" At Cody's outburst, Tapeworm flung out his arm and held it in front of Cody's chest so that he couldn't reach his brother.

"Zack, don't you remember tonight is the best day to get a view of the meteor shower?" Tapeworm prompted. "And the school is putting on an event to see it?"

Zack waved a hand. He vaguely remembered Cody going on and on about some sort of a meteor or comet a few months before, but he had only been half paying attention while playing a video game. As a matter of fact he remembered then changing the channel to a basket ball game to drown him out even further.

"You pay about $5 for a ticket to go see it and there's plenty of food. Half of the money we make goes to the observatory because they're the ones that are partnering with us to put on the event," Tapeworm explained. "If you aren't already going you should think about it."

"To sit on a blanket in the middle of the park, freezing my ass off and wondering if there's anything, _anything_ better that I could be doing?" Zack thought about it for a moment. "Nope. Still not my idea of fun."

"Well, let me put it in words that you can probably understand," Cody said with an air of amusement. "It'll be cold, you and Max can share a blanket and make-out or whatever while the rest of us actually try to see history in the making."

"Making out with my girlfriend all night, sounds like history in the making to me," Zack said with laugh. He reached into his pockets, coming to a stop by his locker. "You know, I think I'm starting to run low on cash."

"That's a shock," Tapeworm commented.

Zack then reached out and grabbed onto his brother. Amidst Cody's protests he pulled out his wallet and flipped open a pocket, sliding out a five dollar bill before passing it over to Tapeworm. "Sorry, bro. I'll have to pay you back."

"Don't worry about it." Cody pulled out his cell phone and punched a few numbers into it. Then he smiled to himself once he saw the total that came up. "By my estimate, I won't ever have to work for a living because you'll be too busy paying me back. What's five dollars more?"

Zack stuck his tongue out in reply and turned his attention to their girl friends as they walked up the hallway from their last class of the day. "Hey." He lifted his chin in greeting before reaching out his arm and put it around Max's shoulders, pulling her into his side. "Consider yourself lucky that you've got a date for this…meteor thingy going on tonight."

Max smiled up at him before she turned to Cody and Tapeworm. "Did you tell him it cost five bucks?" She asked.

"Yep," Tapeworm replied with a bright smile.

"Told you he'd fall for it."

"I'll pay you your half later."

"Hey!" Zack frowned as his friends laughed. "I can't believe you hustled me out of my money." He ignored Cody as he cleared his throat. " _I'm_ the one that's supposed to be the hustler."

"It's just you getting a taste of your own medicine, Zack," Crystal commented as her laughter faded. "Considering how many times you managed to con us out of our own money I'd say this is justifiable." She crossed her arms, blowing her strand of blue hair from her eyes. "Besides, it wouldn't be fun without all of us there."

"Freezing my ass off, sounds fun," Zack commented. His eyes the shifted over to Riley and Rhuben and he lifted his chin. "What about you two? You nearly have a mental breakdown every time it snows here and you're willing to go to this…thing?"

"Yeah, why not?" Rhuben asked. "I've always been interested in astronomy."

"I didn't know that," Cody said, eyebrows rising curiously. "You should join the club."

"Yeah, I like to see if I can recognize any of the stars and things out there. If it were a class I'd be all for it. But for the club," She shrugged. "I already have too much on my plate with the swim team, homework, work, and photography club, but thanks for the offer."

Zack did his best not to roll his eyes. _Like she's really going to join your stupid club,_ Zack thought. _I really need to help you with your flirting skills, because that was probably the lamest thing I've ever heard?_ But not everyone could be on his level when it came to dating and girls. For that he was on an entirely different playing field. _Huh, maybe Cody was right about the whole stargazing thing being romantic. It'd definitely give me and Max some time alone together._ For the last couple of weeks they hadn't had much time to spend together—well, not a lot of time doing what _he_ wanted to do. Every time they met up it was to do homework—with no breaks, in between classes—he already had a detention placed on him that morning from PDA in the hallways, or when practice ended—and there was nothing less romantic than having all of their teammates watching and making fun of them.

He shifted his attention back to his friends as Riley let out a light sigh, pulling down the sleeves of her sweatshirt so that they covered her hands. It made him laugh a little; as much as she was laidback about a lot of things, the cold was one thing she continued to complain about every year. And living in Boston there were only two seasons; winter and summer. And he wasn't above teasing her each and every time he found her bundled up in almost everything she owned while he was fine in a light jacket.

"So you're actually going to risk getting even the slightest bit of a chill to watch, too?" He teased her.

Riley shrugged though looked to be on the verge of telling him off. "I like looking at the meteors and stuff, making wishes every now and then, but I could do without the cold," she admitted. "So if we're all going we can save a spot. Bring some food and all that." She paused and smirked. "I mean enough for us _and_ Tapeworm." Taking a step forward she placed her hand on his shoulder. "Are you still up for hot dogs?"

Tapeworm flushed, knowing how much of an appetite he had despite how lanky he was. "Yeah, hot dogs are fine."

"Ace, we've got that covered," Patrick said as he and Noah walked over with Aaron and Sydney. "We've got more than enough food to go around and Uncle Christian has wanted us to get out of the house more often lately."

Crystal frowned at him. "That's because Dad's tired of tripping over your skateboard."

"So'm I," Aaron agreed.

Sydney reached out and poked Patrick in the side. "I _told_ you to move it," he scolded his big brother. Patrick rolled his eyes over to his twin, Noah, finding him grinning at him. In retaliation, Patrick picked up his hand and pushed Noah's face away from him.

Zack laughed to himself as he watched the exchange. It was much like the way he and Cody interacted. Part of him made light of it and made a joke that Patrick and Noah were very much like mini versions of him and his twin brother but another part of him did see how it might be something to become a bit worried about. He worried about Noah turning completely into a neurotic, slightly arrogant, science addicted freak like Cody was.

(And of course he was the only one allowed to call Cody that).

"Zack? Zack!"

"What?" Zack snapped back to attention and found Max looking at him expectantly. "Sorry, I wasn't paying attention."

"I know. I've called your name like ten times, dude," Max pointed out. She punched him on the arm as she said so then pointed over her shoulder. "We've got basketball practice remember?"

"Right, let's go." He brought his hand down and grabbed onto hers, pulling his backpack further up his shoulder, nodding to Riley, Rhuben, Sydney, and Aaron. "We'll meet you guys after your swim practice, like outside the gym or whatever."

"I've got to stop by the house to get my gear anyway," Crystal said. "So I'll get the food and some extra blankets. Wouldn't want anyone to freeze." She laughed to herself as she stepped around the group and headed off in the opposite direction.

"You're not funny, cuz!" Riley called after her.

"I don't know, last time you practically had a conniption when you got snowflakes in your eyes," Cody pointed out.

Rhuben placed her hand on Cody's shoulder. "Don't help her, Codes." She steered him off down the hallway towards the gym. Zack gave Cody a thumbs up as he went by, hoping to relieve a little bit of the embarrassed excitement that came over his brother's face. But that just made Cody's face redden even further as he glared back at him, making a cutting motion across his throat.

 _Touchy,_ Zack thought. He turned to appeal to Max. "Geez, I try to help him out a little and this is the thanks I get."

"You can't blame him for thinking that you're up to something, dude," Max pointed out. She tightened her grip on his hand as the two strolled down the hallway behind their friends. "I'm glad you're coming tonight. We haven't been able to spend any time together, lately."

"Um, excuse me, but all of those study dates you've forced upon me have been time spent enough," Zack pointed out. "Even though you didn't ever let us take more than five minutes for a break. And not the _fun_ kind."

Max rolled her eyes. "You know I need to make sure my applications are good, Zack," Max replied. "And if that means I have to do a lot of homework and keep my grades up, then I'll do it." She leaned against his side and smiled up at him. "Besides, I figured we could use tonight to make up for all the time that we haven't been able to use before."

Zack's eyebrows ticked upwards in amusement, immediately catching on to what she was implying. "You read my mind." He bent down and gave her a quick kiss.

Max laughed to herself when she ended the kiss. "Knowing your head, Zack, there's not a lot that's going on in it."

"Very funny."

* * *

True to Max's word, the two _did_ spend a lot of time together while stargazing. Or at least, when he was paying attention to them, only enough to catch his breath. There were oohing and aahing coming from those looking through their telescopes nearby, he could even hear Cody going on and on about some sort of an undiscovered galaxy with Tapeworm, Sydney, and Aaron. But then the young boys soon got bored and ran around the grassy area with Crystal calling after them to watch where they were going as they almost careened into a few stargazers every now and then

Finally, Zack couldn't ignore is growling stomach anymore and pulled back from the long kiss he had been entangled with, with Max. "Sorry, but I really need something to eat," he apologized, leaning back from his girlfriend.

"No problem," Max replied as she sat up on the picnic blanket, straightening the bottom of her shirt. "It was only a matter of time. There's nothing in the world that can get between you and food." She sat up just as a football came hurtling her way.

"Hey, Max, want to play catch for a bit?" Tapeworm called over to her.

"Sure." Max threw back a perfect spiraling pass and walked closer to him. "But I thought you and Cody were looking at some sort of undiscovered galaxy or something."

"I was." Tapeworm nodded over to the telescope where Cody was adjusting it while saying something to Rhuben, who nodded to whatever he was saying. "He's a bit preoccupied at the moment. Come on."

"I'll catch you later, Zack," Max said. She gave him a quick kiss on the cheek before trotting over the grass, hands over her head to catch the throw Tapeworm threw her way. Zack stretched his arms over his head before laying back across the blanket, closing his eyes once more.

"Okay, I know you usually fall asleep during class but even I didn't think it was possible for you to fall asleep with this, too. It doesn't even have a thing to do with school."

"Anything that has to do with science bores me to death," Zack muttered, eyes still closed. "It was a miracle Cody could even convince me to come."

"I reckon Max had something to do with it, too." Riley said. There was an air of amusement in her voice and Zack could practically see the large, smug grin on her face. "Something about promising to make sure it was a good time for you tonight. Though I think the teachers were only minutes away from making sure that didn't happen." She sat down next to him, placing a Gatorade bottle by his side. "Or at least turning on a hose or something."

"Does everyone need to make fun of us like that?" Zack finally opened his eyes and sat up. He picked up the Gatorade bottle she brought him, nodded his thanks, and took a sip. "It's getting old."

"That's what friends are for, yeah?" She replied.

"And I thought we were all here to watch that." Zack pointed towards the sky that was littered with stars like glitter thrown across a black canvas. "Make wishes and all that."

"You sound like you don't believe in it."

Zack shrugged and turned back to Riley. "Do you?" He asked.

Riley bobbed her head back and forth, tucking her red strand of hair behind her ear. "Kind of like Astrology. I think its fun to see what the different signs have to say about personalities and who is a better match for whom. And I wish on a lot of things, but realistically it's all up to coincidence rather than a wish being what comes true. Still, it's fun."

"Right and I'd bet that if you see a shooting star you'd wish for your one true love right?" Zack teased. "Well, no need, he's sitting right next to you."

"Actually, I'd wish to get a good grade on my science test," Riley admitted. "Uncle Christian would probably kill me if I get lower than a B. But nice try, boofhead." She reached out and shoved him on the arm.

"That's it?" His nose wrinkled. "Just a good grade on a test? Man, what a waste of a wish. Do it on world peace or to be rich or to get automatic A's on absolutely everything. But not just on one test."

"Hey, it's _my_ wish not yours. As long as I didn't wish on anything as weird as, I don't know a pool full of Jell-O!"

A laugh escaped Zack's lips. "I wished for that once. It sounded cool. Until Cody told me why it wouldn't work and if it did it would just cause lots of problems. Not to mention that if you got into the pool you have a really good chance of suffocating." He threw his hands into the air. "I didn't even want to swim in it, I just wanted to eat it!"

Now Riley laughed. "And that's not the weirdest thing you've ever wished for?"

Zack thought for a moment then let out a low chuckle. "No. I didn't really wish on a lot of things. This one's not weird, but I used to wish that Mom would get more money, like, all the time. During my birthday, Christmas, anything that you can make wishes on, I'd wish for that. Mostly so that she could buy me whatever it was I wanted, but I was tired of her having to worry so much about whether or not we could pay the bills." He frowned. "I hated having to see Mom crying to Grandpa Jim and Grandma Betty about all of the work she had to do because Dad wasn't bringing much to the table."

"I can't imagine it's that surprising though," Riley said slowly. "I mean, no offense to your Dad, but it is sort of hard to live off of that sort of salary when revenue comes mostly from ticket sales."

Zack nodded. If there was anyone that would know, it was certainly her. It was still hard for him to think that she was so infamous back in her hometown because of her name as well as her stint in the music industry. Especially now that she did her best to keep away from performing or anything unless it was her idea. He could see how much she missed it despite the bad experiences she had.

Riley looked at him curiously. "You know you don't ever really talk about your grandparents."

Zack's frown deepened as he realized it was true. Since having moved to Boston he really hadn't said anything about them. They didn't usually come up in conversation except for the disgusting things that may have happened while he and Cody were staying there—false teeth in his chocolate milk, having to go to the rec center and sit in saunas with wrinkly old men, and he wasn't even about to start with the whole locker room situation. "Well, I can't imagine it's something you'd want to talk about."

"You barely talk about your family, I'd like to know," Riley said honestly. Zack raised an eyebrow and she quickly held up a hand. "Just as long as you don't try to make me return the favor."

"That's not entirely fair," Zack pointed out.

Now Riley smirked. "All of my family except for Julius is here and you've known us for at least four years now, yeah? I think it is. But I can tell you want to ask; no, I've never wished for anything that had to do with my parents." She held up a finger. "Though I _have_ wished for a dog for a long time and when I finaly got it, I didn't wish for one anymore."

"I didn't know you had a dog."

"He's back home; I wasn't able to bring him over here. So now he's being taken care of by Julius and my grandparents." She thought for a moment. "Honestly, I'm surprised they were able to considering how many pets we had before we left." She shrugged and changed the subject. "Have you ever had a pet?"

"No. None of the places we've ever lived allowed them." He started to laugh. "There was one time, though, that Cody brought a skunk into the Tipton hotel. He keeps saying he thought it was a black cat with a white stripe, but even I don't think he would've made that mistake." He puffed a breath of air on his fist and rubbed it against his chest. "I think for a minute he went over to the dark side and wanted to play a prank on Mr. Moseby but couldn't handle it."

Riley laughed. "Only you would be disappointed that Cody wouldn't be exactly like you in terms of messing with Mr. Moseby."

"Yeah, he had to go and get all 'self-righteous' and care about other people's 'feelings'." Zack used air quotes around the words and shook his head. "Honestly, if he didn't look like me I'd be afraid that I was given the wrong twin brother at the hospital or something." He rubbed the back of his neck. "Honestly, I still think that every now and then. I mean, I know not everyone can be as handsome as I am, but geez he could at least try."

"Your sense of self worth is astounding yet very refreshing, boofhead," Riley said. She shook her head before tilting her head back to look up at the sky. "Especially when it comes to things like this. People tend to go into their whole 'woe-is-me-where-is-my-place-in-life sort of thing." She shrugged, wrapping her arms around her knees. "I never liked the idea of trying to figure it out, there's already enough that we have to deal with, with school and all of that stuff. It just makes things worse when wondering if you're at the place you should be in life." She lowered her chin to her knees, her voice lowering as well. "And knowing there are others that aren't."

Zack stayed quiet, unsure of what he could say that would comfort her, or a good way to change the subject.

She took in a deep breath and sat up straight once more. "But what do I know?"

"Sounds like you know a lot," Zack said gently.

"Not really. Like I said, I do it for fun but realistically… it's not in the stars to hold our destiny but in ourselves." She shook her head. "I guess I'll just have to see for myself."

Zack smiled and looked up towards the sky once more, watching as more and more stars seemed ot pop out as the sky continued to darken. "I know exactly what you mean."


	11. 11: Sharing A Secret

**11: Sharing a secret**

 **Age: 13/14**

* * *

"But why do _I_ have to go? Can't you just get the information for me?"

Cody threw a withering glance Zack's way before hitching his backpack up his shoulders. "Because it's a project, Zack. A project with a partner. I'm not your partner; I'm not doing your work for you." He rolled his eyes. "And it's just the school library; you're acting like I'm sending you off to some sort of a torture chamber."

Now Zack gave Cody a look. "Libraries _are_ torture. You have to be quiet and the librarian is older and ugly, not young and hot." He threw his hands into the air. "If the librarian looked like Carrie Underwood or Angelina Jolie or even Maddie, I'd spend _all_ my time there."

"Like you can get Angelina Jolie."

"I could if I had the chance."

"Right, like the time that you thought Maddie would date you if you did better at school?"

"Hey, that was foolproof plan which _would've_ worked if I had any interest in science at all. That's the only subject that won't be anything but completely boring."

"And yet it was still a plan that didn't work out." Cody flicked his hair form his face and leveled his brother with an even gaze. "Ergo, it wasn't foolproof, ergo, you're an idiot."

"Ergo, you're a dork for knowing what ergo means." Zack smirked as Cody shot him another withering glance, this time with a roll of his eyes.

Shoving his hands into the pockets of his cargo shorts, Zack gazed wistfully at Liberty Park as they passed the entrance. He could see many kids his age running around, hanging out, skateboarding, and playing soccer. Everything he would rather be doing than spending the entire day at the library looking for information of an obscure history topic he would've preferred to not think about let alone learn. It was when Zack sighed, again, that Cody had enough of his brother's complaining and tried a different tactic.

"I don't know what you're complaining about," Cody remarked. "You've been trying for weeks to get Riley's attention and now you're partnered with her on a project that's going to take some time. At least you get to spend the entire day with her."

"At least I can _talk_ to her," Zack shot back. His smirked widened. "Every time you come around Rhuben it's like your entire face freezes. Trust me when I say it's even funnier than watching you try to play basketball. I haven't seen anyone get hit in the face with their own ball so many times before."

Cody ignored Zack's diss and continued to try and motivate his brother. "Well, think of it like this, now's your chance to get her to see you as anything but the annoying jerk you already _are!"_ He slapped Zack hard on the shoulder, faking a warm smile.

"Yeah, but I'd rather be doing _anything_ but studying." He said studying like it was a disease, making Cody shake his head and mumble something like 'Only four more years' under his breath. Finally, the two arrived at the library and Cody led the way inside.

"Please, at least try," Cody finally said. "I know it's the beginning of the year and I know you hate school more than anything in the world, but I don't want you to fail this year all because of one stupid project. We're not in elementary school anymore. Our teachers aren't going to advance you just because they want to get rid of you." He paused. "If that were the case I would've gotten rid of you a while ago."

Zack scowled and reached out, smacking Cody on the back of the head with the back of his hand, causing Cody to reach out and shove him back. The two glared at each other and walked further into the library where they said they were going to meet the twin girls. As soon as they spotted them Cody hurried over to apologize.

"You're late," Riley commented, looking at her watch.

"I know," Cody said. He pressed his palms together. "I know. I'm sorry. I had to practically drag Zack away from his video game so we could even leave the Tipton. And doing that is a lot harder than you would think."

"Mm, sounds like our brothers, yeah?" Rhuben commented to Riley, who shrugged and smiled in response. Rhuben then held up her hand. "It's not a big deal just as long as we're out of here by three."

"Yeah, whatever," Zack agreed without enthusiasm. "Let's just get this over with." Cody shot him a disapproving glance and left the area with Rhuben trailing along beside him. Zack watched with disdain as they walked away, already engrossed in what they were going to do for their project.

Rolling his eyes, Zack turned back to Riley to find that she already had a notebook opened up and was looking through it. "Look, you probably don't want to be here as much as I do—"

"I don't want to be here with _you,_ " Riley quickly interrupted him. "I don't mind being _here_. Anything to get out of the house for a while," she added under her breath. Then she flipped her hair back from her face and leaned back in her seat. It took a second, and then Zack noticed a strange look come across her face before she started to dig into the pockets of her jean jacket.

Zack smiled back at her. "But you can't get any better company than me, Sweet Thang."

"I beg to differ. And don't call me 'Sweet Thang'." She pulled out a compact mirror and inspected her face.

"Do you prefer babe? Because I'm good with that, too."

"No."

Now Zack's eyebrows rose as Riley arranged her hair down around the sides of her face.

Okay.

Since they had met she did a good job of pretending she wasn't like other girls. (He didn't know many girls that didn't at least find _something_ about him to be attractive). But for the amount of time they had been in school together they had been a bit antagonistic towards each other. Or at least Riley was to him. He did nothing but try to be nice to her, to show her some attention, to make her feel a little special. And she did nothing but shoot him down left and right if not seem to take a page out of Cody's book and made fun of him for just about everything.

"I knew it," Zack declared. Riley put down her compact mirror and gazed at him in confusion. "You're just like all of those other girls who only cares about their appearance. You had me going for a while thinking that you were different."

A light chuckle escaped Riley's lips as she lowered her arms to the table top. "You think _I_ care what _you_ think? I've got bigger things to worry about, mate." She picked up her notebook and dropped it down onto the table with a light clack sound. "Like this project. I don't know about you, but I have to get a good grade on this. I've seen the way teachers act around you and I'm not going to do all of this work by myself. So you go over there, and find this book!" She wrote down the title and shoved it at him. "And bring it back here."

Zack's upper lip curled. "You can't tell me what to do."

Riley's eyes flashed and she smirked. "I just did."

Pressing his lips together, Zack looked around the library. Their area—he wasn't even sure what area of the library it was—was pretty empty. Emptier than he wished it would be; it reminded him he was the only schmuck that was actually spending his weekend studying. The librarian sat quietly at her desk, looking at something on the monitor. She would look up every now and then, her gaze scanning the floor of the library before turning back to her computer. Then there were a few people at the computers nearby, the same science nerds that Cody always hung out with.

 _Even Tapeworm's not here today and he likes to study as much as Cody does,_ Zack thought as he shook his head. _Why do I have to be here? _He looked over at Riley once more, watching as she flipped back and forth through the book that sat in front of her, resting her cheek in her hand. Her hair fell away from her face, giving him a good look at her freckles and blue eyes. And once again he felt attracted to her, not many people could speak to him the way she did and get away with it. (Other than his mother and that certainly was _not_ the same). When he argued with his mother it was disrespectful, when he argued with Riley it was fun. And made him more interested in her.

Finally, she looked up and her eyes shifted when she noticed Zack still sitting in front of her. "What are you still doing here?"

"What book am I getting again?"

"The one I just gave you the title of."

"No, I get that. But what does it have to do with our topic?" He was bluffing; he knew exactly what it had to do with it. History was actually one of his best subjects. But no one else believed he would be good in school so he decided to fake them out. Teachers didn't expect him to do much work or do well and then he would come back later and at least do a good job in that class. He definitely was _not_ an idiot.

Riley blinked at him in surprise. Her eyes widened and then narrowed and her face took in a red hue. Finally, she stood up so quickly that her seat fell to the ground, causing the librarian to turn their way, shushing them loudly. Riley grabbed the sheet of paper from him and walked around the table in long strides. "Boofhead," she muttered as she passed him, along with a few other words. He wasn't sure what they were.

Chuckling to himself, Zack pushed back his seat and got up. He followed Riley as she walked between numerous bookshelves, stopping every now and then to look at her writing and at the signs above the bookshelves. Zack came up behind her and watched for a second, before turning his head to find the exact section she was looking for.

Clearing his throat, Zack said, "I don't know how libraries work in England—"

"—Australia—"she swiftly interrupted.

"—Whatever. But here they have specific sections that show you the books you need. And the book you need is over here." Zack motioned to the side then leaned around Riley to pluck the sheet of appear from her hand and walked into the stacks of books. He found the book they need and turned, holding it out to Riley.

She gazed at him warily, almost glaring at him. "I thought you didn't know what the book had to do with our project," she accused him. "How did you know it was in this section?"

Zack shrugged and smiled, continuing to hold the book out to her. When she grasped the other end of it, clearly to take it back, Zack held tightly onto the book before pulling his arm back, causing Riley to take a few steps forward. He noticed her breath hitch in her throat and her eyes flash towards his face then lower once more. "Because I'm not stupid," he explained. "Any idiot knows how to walk through a library and find a book. It's, like, second grade knowledge."

"I'm surprised you even made it this far," Riley remarked.

Zack smiled. "I get that a lot. Actually, I think it's the same thing every teacher has said to me for the past few years."

He paused, eyebrows furrowing together. He had no idea why he said that. No one else really knew about it. Sure, Cody made jokes but he didn't know how true his jokes were. Nearly every year he and their mother had to go to the principal's office or the guidance counselor's office, or meet with all of his teachers to be sure a studying plan was implemented for him to continue to raise in grades.

And nearly every teacher and said, verbatim, they were surprised he got to their new grade. Especially considering his grades, which were in the solid C range once everything was averaged out, were constantly compared to Cody's straight A-pluses, which would probably be higher if there was the chance. But he still didn't say anything to Cody or any of his friends about it. Tapeworm was just as smart as Cody so it wouldn't help if he tried to talk to him about it and then Max was…an overachiever. Sure, she didn't get the same kinds of grades that Cody and Tapeworm got, but she was good at school. Nearly every school thing that came her way; be it a performance, school work, an activity, or some sort of club, she tackled it head on and excelled.

Even Riley and Rhuben who were now in his classes seemed to be good at just about every subject that came their way; though Riley struggled with science and Rhuben struggled with history. It didn't help that Cody was so willing to help them on everything and yet couldn't be patient enough to help his own brother. _Not like you even make it easy for him,_ Zack reminded himself.

It wasn't his fault that messing with Cody was about one hundred times more fun than actually doing any work.

"That sucks," Riley said and Zack head a tone of sympathy in her voice. "No one should be written off like that."

"I'm used to it. Besides, it's not like you haven't done it." Riley opened her mouth to protest and Zack pushed the book into her hands. "Oh please, don't worry about it. Like I said, it happens a lot. So it's good to surprise people every now and then."

Riley took the book and her arm dropped to her side. She looked at the cover for a minute then looked back up at him once more, loosely crossing her arms. "Like I said, no one deserves to be treated like that. I reckon I know how you feel, yeah? A bunch of boofheads…they think they know me based on the way I dress, the way I look…" she shook her head. "Even people who are the closest to you have their own opinions of you."

"Exactly," Zack agreed. "You see, I knew there was something about you that I liked. Other than being really hot, of course." He started to put his arm around her shoulder. "So why don't you and I just skip this little library adventure that we've got going on and get something to eat. Maybe go see a movie. As much as I'm good looking, I'm even better at dating."

"Something tells me you're not making that up," Riley said. Then Zack's arm landed on her shoulders and her eyes widened. Before she could stop herself she let out a curse and ducked out from underneath Zack's arm with a loud yelp. Startled, Zack jumped backwards, holding his hands up. "Ow! Let go!" She turned away, grasped her shoulder, and winced in pain. A growl escaped her lips as her eyes squeezed shut, still holding onto her arm.

Zack's face screwed up in frustration and annoyance. "I barely touched you."

"It still hurt, you jerk!"

"I'm a jerk for _touching_ you?" Zack demanded. He watched in bewilderment as Riley continued to take steps away from him before walking away. "Geez, I knew women had mood swings but maybe they're even worse when you're from a different country. I mean, you people are supposed to be all laid-back and—"

"You _people?_ What's _that_ supposed to mean? _"_ Riley demanded, whipping around to face him. The force of her turn caused her jacket to blow open and Zack paused. Something Had caught his eye and he wasn't quite sure what to make of it. His first thought was that it was a tattoo, but when he wondered why anyone would want _that_ tattooed on their arm. But then again people did some strange things and she had already proven that she had at least one tattoo. But _that?_

His second thought was that his eyes were playing tricks on him, as they tended to do when he was waiting for time to pass. Or in his dreams when he had millions of girls falling for him while he counted stacks and stacks of money. But he was sure he saw what he saw.

"What?"

At Riley's snap, Zack forced himself to pay attention, taking his gaze away from her arm. "What was that?"

Now Riley's eyes shifted and she stood up straight, steeling herself. Zack recognized it from the times he and Cody and their Dad wrestled. Kurt would always let them think they were going to win before he steeled all of his muscles and they couldn't even budge him. The other time was when he knew he was seconds away from being lectured about something and his body made the involuntary movement as if to defend himself.

"What was what?" she finally asked.

"That thing on your arm."

"I don't have anything on my arm."

Now Zack frowned. He wasn't stupid. He knew he saw something on her arm. Reaching out, Zack tried to grab onto the sleeve of her jacket and Riley quickly backed away again. He moved towards her again and Riley backed away once more, but not fast enough and Zack grabbed onto the sleeve of her jacket. Riley reached up and grabbed onto his wrist, squeezing as tightly as she could.

"I swear to God if you don't let go of me, I'll break your fucking wrist," she hissed.

Normally Zack would've listened to the warning and backed away. Mr. Moseby, who was very short, was scary when he started to glare and growl, but even though this girl was just about his height—if not taller—she was terrifying. Even from the way her eyes flashed he could tell she was serious. But he still wanted to know if he was right.

"Not until I see what's on your arm."

"There's nothing on my bloody arm!"

The two continued to shuffle back and forth, trying to overpower each other. It got to the point that Zack managed to pin Riley against a bookshelf behind her, the force knocking books to the ground that just managed to overpower her cry of pain. It was then Zack looked up to find the librarian standing at the opening of the bookshelves looking at them funny. Quickly, Zack took a step back, holding up his hands as she walked closer.

"Mr. Martin, I've told you time and time again that you need to be quiet in the library, that you are not allowed to have food in here, and that you can't use the school computers to deface the images of our teachers," she said. "However, I didn't believe I needed to tell you about the school's code of conduct in terms of the PDA that's allowed."

"Then obviously you haven't met anyone I've gone out with," Zack quipped. Out of the corner of his eye he could see Riley's eyes glued to the library as she very slowly tried to adjust her jacket back up her arms.

The librarian bristled. "I'm going to keep my eye on you, Mr. Martin."

"You and everyone else in this school Miss. Flannigan, thanks." Zack faked a smile and a wave, waiting for her to leave the room. Then he turned and his eyes widened as he caught sight of what he had thought he'd seen before.

Zack tried to keep his mouth from dropping open but found that he couldn't ignore the urge. His jaw dropped. Hard. So hard and so fast that it ached. But what else was he going to do other than stare at the dark bruises that lined her arms and shoulders. No wonder she was wincing with every move she made.

"It's nothing," She said quickly, still trying to pull up her jacket and wincing the whole way. "I'm just a bit of a klutz."

"I haven't seen you trip or fall ever since I met you," Zack protested.

"You haven't known me that long."

"Long enough." He licked his lips. "What happened?"

"Nothing," She repeated. A worried look came over her face and she turned, chewing her bottom lip. "Nothing happened." She ran her hand through her hair and shrugged. "Haven't you ever fallen before?"

"I've fallen before, but bruises like _that_ I've only ever gotten from my friends when we're playing hockey or something. That's not something you get when you fall over."

Riley loosely grabbed her elbows as she crossed her arms. Her eyes narrowed into slits and she practically spat as she stepped up into his face."Good for you, boofhead, you really _aren't_ as dumb as you look."

"Thanks for the complement." Zack threw out his arm and blocked Riley from walking away from him again. "What happened?"

There must've been something in his voice that proved how serious he was, either that or she was tired of trying to deny it when he continued to insist, because she took a deep breath and briefly closed her eyes. When she opened them again she shrugged and turned away from him, scratching the back of her neck. "So every now and then my Dad gets mad about things. So what?"

"You're telling me your Dad hits you?"

"He just gets mad, it's not a big deal," she repeated.

"I don't think—"

"—Riles?" Zack looked over as Cody and Rhuben poked them head around the stacks and started towards their respective twin. "Dad just called and said we have to get going. He's had something come up and we need to go _now_ or else…" she trailed off as Riley nodded. She ran her hand through her hair.

"I got it," She agreed. "We can go. We've finished all of the research we needed to get. Right?" Her eyes shifted to Zack and bored into his. Zack held his breath, trying to figure out what to say, but he found himself tongue-tied. Finally he just nodded and Riley gave a small nod back. "So we can go. Let me just get my stuff."

Zack started to follow her and Riley stopped, turning back to him. She kept her head ducked down but spoke in an urgent whisper, "You can't tell anyone what I told you," she said.

Zack opened his mouth, closed it, opened it, and closed it again. He didn't know what to say let alone how to process what had just been told her. Finally, he nodded again and Riley continued to look at him before following her sister once more. He couldn't be sure but he thought he saw her smile a little.

"So, are you still bored?" Cody asked, voice dripping with sarcasm. "Or did you just manage to complete your mission of managing to piss off the entire female population?"

"Not as pissed as some people can get," Zack replied.


	12. 12: Holding Hands

**12: Holding Hands**

 **Age: 18**

* * *

A chill rolled down Riley's spine as she pulled her hands up into the sleeves of her sweatshirt.

For once in her life she absolutely hated her stubborn personality when she could've been nice and warm. But no, she always had to prove something. And this time around it was how she was not, in fact, cold and didn't think it was cold at all. She was just fine in her sweatshirt, jeans, and boots. And she would've been just fine if 'it wasn't that cold' was by the standards of her home country. But Boston 'cold' and Australia 'cold' were two completely different things.

She should have known when Bostonians said it 'wasn't that cold' it meant her toes would freeze, fall off and becomes pebbles within her shoes. That the tip of her nose would turn as red as her dyed hair with her cheeks a matching accessory. That she would shiver so badly it appeared she was having a seizure. (Some guy had actually stopped them to be sure she was okay, she was shaking so badly. Zack had laughed so hard he fell back into the piled up snow, allowing Riley to kick it into his face in retaliation).

And yet through it all she refused to admit she was cold. So sue her, she was raised not to let anyone see her sweat or show any weakness. And being an inconvenience or indebted to anyone else was a sure sign of being weak in her book. It was a dangerous thought and one she was trying her hardest to break, but habits died hard.

Snowflakes continued to fall past her nose, sticking to her eyelashes and glittering against her cheeks as they melted. Clouds of breath billowed in front of her as she tried to subdue her chattering teeth and shaking limbs. Her shoes scrunched over the snow in small, shuffling steps as she did her best to keep up with Zack's longer more confident strides.

Riley eyed Zack with disdain as he lightly whistled a merry tune despite the gray clouds that hung overhead. With a beanie pulled low over his hair, a scarf nestled comfortably around his neck, and his hands shoved into the pockets of his jacket, he was the picture of comfort in the cold weather.

And she hated him for it.

It was silly, but she was spiteful.

All those ski trips where she opted to stay inside the cabin and watch TV or sit in the hot tub seemed to have finally caught up with her. Sure there were times where she would venture out to learn how to snowboard or ski, but soon she would find herself wrapped up in blankets and wondering why she thought it was a good idea.

Without pausing his tune, Zack looked at Riley out of the corner of his eye then smiled. Finally, he dropped the cheery tune she was sure she'd grow to hate if he whistled anymore. Either that or he would find his tongue forcibly stuck to the nearest light pole.

"You know I can feel you boring holes into the side of my head," he remarked.

"You should be used to it by now," Riley replied darkly. As much as she liked—or maybe loved, she wasn't quite sure but felt _something_ strongly for him—her boyfriend there was always something he managed to do that annoyed her.

"Are you _sure_ you're not cold?" The way he asked the question made her feel an increased twinge in hatred for him.

"I'm fine," she managed to say through gritted teeth, doing her best to keep them from audibly chattering.

Nevertheless, Zack chuckled and reached out his hand towards her. On a normal day the two of them would've already been holding hands as they traversed the Boston streets, taking in the city life, a gesture that seemed to be second nature when they were around each other.

Now, however, Riley hunched forward even further and shoved her hands deeper into her sweatshirt pocket. It was as thin as the rest of her sweatshirt, doing a terrible job of keeping the warmth in and the cold out.

"Well, I already knew that." A flirtatious grin spread across his face as he pulled his hands from his pockets. "But you're freezing, I can tell." He brought his hand up to his mouth and used his teeth to pull off his gloves. "Give me your hand."

"And freeze even more?" Her eyes widened in horror. "Forget it, boofhead!"

He reached out and tugged her hands from her sweatshirt pocket and wrapped his around hers, pressing his palms against her fingertips. He rubbed them briskly between his own, alternatively blowing on them. Zack kept it up for another moment then lowered his hands. "Better?" At the shake of her head he rolled his eyes. "You Australians, so spoiled with your warm weather and beaches."

"If the world was _meant_ to be cold, it would always stay that way." She sounded ridiculous and knew it. But she felt the need to complain a little bit more. Riley reached out and tugged on the end of his sleeves. "Give me your hoodie, Z."

He took a step back. "And have _me_ freeze? I don't think so." Zack sniffed loudly and pressed his palm against his nose as he sucked back to keep his nose from running. The he plugged his nostril with his finger and blew out. Riley's expression twisted up into abject horror, unable to tear her eyes away.

Once nothing came out Zack sucked back hard through his nose, cleared his throat and turned to the side to spit with whatever came up landing on the ground beside him. Then he turned back and held his hand out towards her again. Riley took a step back, sticking her hands into her armpits.

"What?" He looked genuinely confused. He took a step towards her. "I'm not contagious."

Riley took another step back. "Don't touch me."

"Oh, come on, Ley!"

"Zack, that's disgusting!" He took another step towards her and she took another large one away from him. "It's so…" she mimed puking. "I don't understand how you don't see a bloody problem with that." Then she paused. "Do you ever wash your hands?"

Zack rolled his eye again, dropping his hands to his sides. "Can I at least kiss you?"

With a smirk Riley lifted her hands and placed her index fingers together in a cross, as if she were warding off evil. "I don't know where your lips have been, mate."

"On yours." Then a thoughtful expression came to his face and he smiled. "And around a roast beef hoagie from Beantown."

"I'm so glad you finished your sentence with that and not what I was thinking," Riley said honestly.

"Funny."

"I try."

"Fine." Zack wiped his palm off on the side of his jeans at her indignant look and placed his gloves over his hands once more. Then he walked over, his footsteps crunching over the snow until he stood in front of her. He reached up and rubbed her arms, warming her up the best he could.

Then he slid his hands down her arms and closed them around her palm, the cotton holding his warmth over her skin. Riley smiled as she felt the familiar jolt of electricity that came whenever they held hands, warming her entire body as if she had just gulped down a mug of hot chocolate. He smiled back at her, his eyebrows twitching upwards to show he felt it too.

"How'd you do that?" She asked him as they started their stroll again, hands gently swinging back and forth as they went.

"Just lucky, I guess."


	13. 13: Love Letters

**13: Love Letters**

 **Age: 21**

* * *

Hey Hot-Stuff.

So Cody said the best thing that I could do to help you out was to do something nice. Something out of the box. And considering his idea of sending a bunch of flowers is _so_ overdone—and this was after I completely vetoed the idea of writing poetry (you've seen my grade in English)—he suggested that I at least write you a letter.

We've been through a lot together; good times and bad so I don't see how you'd let this much stress and work take you down. I've seen you go through more crap than this, mostly because I'm the one giving you crap. You're a strong lady and I know you can get through this. I don't know, maybe this isn't helping you much I'm not so great with my words. Not on paper, anyway. Again, you've seen my grades.

I mean, I guess I've gotten better at it now; I haven't flunked out of college. Not yet, anyway. Don't forget you have me on your side. I promise. You're my best friend. I'm not afraid to be myself when I'm around you and ever since I met you you've been on my mind. You make me laugh harder than I thought possible and despite the hard times I've brought upon myself you've been there to make me smile and help me out. I guess I should return the favor, right?

Look, I love you, you know that. And even when you weren't sure I know deep down a very tiny part of you knew for sure. You can do this. I'll see you soon.

(Oh and all the scratches on here is Cody correcting my grammar, he insisted that if I'm going to put the effort in it may as well be grammatically correct. Whatever that means).

Love you,

-Zack

.

..

…

Zack,

Your letter couldn't have come at a better time as I've been doubting myself and my future lately.

This isn't a letter that would be hard to read more than it is hard to write. And it's hard because I'm not one that's usually able to express myself in such a vulnerable way. Not before I really got to know you and not in any way I hadn't been able to cover up somehow. But you've always been able to see through that—in that very annoying way you do—so there's no point in trying to hide things here, yeah?

Casanova; it's hard to not see each other in a few months and it's been hard not having you around. And even though I know there's a hole permanently in my heart that only you can fill it's incentive to work harder. Spending this much time away from you has only confirmed for me even more that I don't want to be with anyone else. I don't work with anyone else. You are the love of my life; I love you with all of my heart, body, and soul. From my head to my feet and all the way back.

I love you Zachary.

I can't wait to see you next month for my graduation.

-Riles

xxxx


	14. 14: Bad News

**14: Bad news**

 **Age: 20**

* * *

"Zack?"

Zack removed his hands from his eyes and looked over at Cody as he stuck his head into the bedroom. Behind him were Tapeworm and Max. Cody walked over and sat down on the bed next to Zack while Tapeworm and Max stood in the doorway.

"You're going to be late if you don't get going, dude," Max pointed out.

"Yeah, we can't start without you," Tapeworm added.

A smile pulled at the corner of Zack's lips. "This can go on very easily without me around. I'm sure Mr. Moseby is already getting security to make sure we're not up to something."

"You wouldn't be you if you weren't up to something," Cody pointed out. He ran a hand through his hair then lightly jostled him on the shoulder. "But they're right, we have to get going. Everyone else is already down there."

"I'm coming." Zack reached up and made sure that the tie around his neck was on properly. He didn't really get why he had to wear a tie to something like this. No one ever cared what they wore; the person they were going to see wasn't so bad either. So what was the big deal? But on the phone their mother had insisted and so they made sure to bring their dress bags with their suits from New York City to Boston.

He stood up and smoothed down his jacket and shirt. Then he turned to the mirror and frowned, staring at his reflection. It wasn't right. He wasn't supposed to look like this. It wasn't what he was known for, he wasn't one that even liked to dress up unless he absolutely had to. (Though using it as a romantic gesture didn't hurt every now and then). He even showed up for his senior pictures in his casual clothes while everyone else was dressed up and looking miserable by his own comparison.

(Other than Cody who had dressed up and even practiced his smile in the mirror on days on end, specifically for the pictures that had him posing with all of his science, mathematics, and debate awards and trophies. The only one holing as much being Tapeworm's and Bailey's).

And now he was giving all of that up for one day that he wasn't even sure he could face.

It hit too close to home.

"Do you have the balloons?" Zack asked Max as he turned away from the mirror, fussing with his tie, almost absentmindedly.

She smiled softly and nodded. "Yes, I have the balloons." Tapeworm frowned as he watched Zack and nudged Max on the shoulder. She looked at him and held out her arm as he handed her his jacket. Then he walked over to Zack and brushed his hands aside and fixed it for him. "We have everything you asked us to get just so Mr. Moseby doesn't frisk you first. Relax, dude."

Zack laughed a little.

"That probably wasn't the best word to use given the circumstances," Cody said to her. He thought for a moment then shrugged. "Actually, it's probably the best one you could've used considering…" He reached out and placed his hand on Zack's shoulder and squeezed it hard.

Zack looked at him and he could see just how hard Cody was struggling to stay calm. His eyes were a bit glassy and he blinked hard to keep the tears from falling down his cheeks. He always was the sensitive on but this time Zack wanted nothing mote but to do the same. He felt it, but he couldn't do it. Ever since he got the news he couldn't cry. He didn't scream, he didn't get angry, he didn't do anything. He simply hung up the phone and told Cody.

Cody managed to last for a little but then called their mother and then lost it. It was strange to see Cody cry like that. He had cried because of being picked on, because he was stressed, saying goodbye to someone—Zack had proof that Cody tended to tear up every time he had to say goodbye to Rhuben.

He reached out and gave Cody a long hug.

Cody reached up and wrapped his arms around Zack, holding onto him tightly. It was then Zack realized he was shaking. The reality of everything was starting to get to him. He had no idea how much longer he could last but he needed to hold on until they could at least get their plan done.

Still, staying in the moment just a bit longer wouldn't hurt.

* * *

Zack sniffed and rubbed his nose. Once the ceremony had finished and people started to peter out it was easier for him to find time alone. Staying by Muriel's grave probably wasn't the best place, but he had to drop off his last memento for her. She liked a good prank against Mr. Moseby just as much as he did, let alone wrestling and getting out of doing her maid duties.

It had been a sad day to know she had been fired from the Tipton hotel, but even sadder to have received the call that she had passed away. It was bound to happen sooner than later, she had been a smoker her entire life, didn't work out much, and didn't particularly take care of herself. Buts he was a ball of sunshine around the hotel and now that she was gone…the sun didn't shine as brightly.

Feeling a hand gently rub his neck Zack looked up to find Riley sitting on the ground next to him, gently keeping her hand on his neck. She reached up and brushed the tear away before placing a gentle kiss on his cheek.

"Aren't you going to make fun of me?" He asked her.

"For what?" She replied, eyes searching his.

"For crying so much. For having it hurt so much. For being so weak," Zack replied.

Riley looked offended and even reached out to lightly punch him on the arm for saying as much. "That was the young and incredibly stupid version of me that thought they needed to be tough all the time." She sighed through her nose. "I know society keeps men from expressing their emotions so much but even your mum told you it was okay to cry."

"I never did," Zack admitted. "Not when she was yelling at me. Not when she was scolding me for pulling another prank or for doing badly in school. Or for acting as if the future was always there for me so why should I bother working on the present. I didn't even cry when I left Grandpa Jim and Grandma Sally back in Seattle and left all of the friends I made." He wiped at his face as another tear escaped. "Don't know why I'm crying now, honestly." He sniffed once more and eyed her warily.

"Why aren't you crying?" He asked her. As a matter of fact he didn't remember seeing her or any of her family crying during the funeral. They were upset by Muriel's passing, that was for sure. The time they lived in the Tipton hotel had been rife of pranks and fun-time they shared with Muriel as well. But none of them had shed a tear.

As a matter of fact he expected them to skip the funeral as the short turnaround time was. But they surprised him there, having taken the earliest flight back to the states, which as he found out was only two hours after they heard the news.

For a minute he wasn't sure if Riley heard him, then he saw her eyebrows raise for a moment before she shrugged. "I guess I got used to it," she remarked. "People dying, I mean. As morbid as that sounds, with some of the friends I had back home, my parents…" she shrugged, continuing to stroke his neck.

Zack nodded. He could understand that. "Sucks," he muttered.

"Yeah. That's the thing though…I've gotten used to it but it still hurts."

Zack ran his hands over his face and through his hair. He could practically hear Muriel yelling 'suck it up' in his ears. Could hear her laughing loudly when she, Max, Tapeworm, and Cody threw the water balloons at the beginning of the reception. Could hear her stating, "I'm not cleaning that up!" once the carnage had been done. And he could see her standing over his shoulder, looking down at him with a twinkle in her eyes as she shook her head and reminded him that he had to live life.

With that, the tears came one right after another before they flooded his cheeks. And Zack couldn't do anything to stop himself. His body became wracked with sobs and he pressed the heels of his palms against his eyes to try and stop them. But they kept coming.

Finally, he was engulfed with his body wracking sobs and slumped over into Riley's lap. She leaned over him and rubbed his back with one hand and gently stroked his hair with the other.

* * *

 **A/N:** Not my absolute best but I still like the sentiment behind this one. Sort of hits home, actually.


	15. 15: Getting Out of Trouble

**15: Getting out of trouble**

 **Age: 14**

* * *

Zack muttered to himself as he dug through his backpack, looking for a blank sheet of paper and a pen. A stick of lead from a mechanical pencil. Playground mulch. Anything that would save him within the next ten minutes before the first class of the day started.

"What were you doing when you _weren't_ doing your homework?" Max asked, watching him continue to dig through his bag. "Wait, let me guess. You were probably watching Maddie working at the candy counter, right?"

"What makes you say that?" Tapeworm asked innocently. He reached up and ran a hand though his large, bushy hair. "He could've been watching the documentary on Abraham Lincoln's presidency."

"Oh you mean the one on the history channel?" Cody's eyes immediately lit up as he took a step closer to his tall, lanky friend. "Did you see it? Wasn't it fascinating how they went more into his background in the Illinois Militia?"

"Yeah, not many people know about the Black Hawk War. What did you think about the section on—"

"So how many Zabba Babbas a day are you up to?" Max interrupted, turning back to Zack.

"Probably a five pack and you don't need to be jealous," Zack said, continuing to look through his bag. "Yes, what Maddie and I have is special but there is plenty of my attention that can be shared." He lifted his head from his backpack and smiled at her. "Speaking of which, you wouldn't want to help me with my homework, would you?"

Max smiled back at him. "I'll pass."

"Oh come on, you're passing up a chance for my undivided attention."

"And being able to breathe considering it smells like you haven't changed your socks in the last week or so." She waved a hand in front of her face then reached up to twirled the end of her braided pigtail around her finger. "And besides, the last thing I need is to try and force you to pay attention when you're busy staring at every girl that walks by."

"Well, I'd be with you I wouldn't need to stare at any other girls."

"Again, I'll pass."

Zack sighed. Then he turned to his brother and smiled the most charming smile he could muster. He threw his arm around Cody's shoulders and hugged him to his side. "Heyyy Cody."

"No, Zack, I'm _not_ going to help you with your homework." Cody reached up and pushed Zack's arm off his shoulders where it slapped down his side. "I've told you over and over again that at some point you'll have to learn how to do it yourself."

"Cody, that was in first grade," Zack pointed out.

"And even then you didn't know how to spell your own name."

Zack threw his hands into the air. "What do you need the 'k' for when the 'c' makes the same sound? And even them my name isn't spelled Z-A-C-K-A-R-Y. How does that even make sense?" He sniffed. "I thought we were supposed to be twins. That we were supposed to help each other out."

"Well, there's always the risk you're taking that he'd eventually want to stop helping you because it's stunting your own growth. Not to mention the chance teachers would find that your work would continue to be so similar that you might get pulled down if there was ever a chance of you being questioned for cheating," Tapeworm rambled off.

"And my quota of helping you out has run dry," Cody added.

Zack's eyes narrowed as he looked back and forth between Tapeworm and Cody. Not only did they have to be so infuriatingly smart but it didn't help that Tapeworm was making it harder for Zack to pressure Cody into helping him. Normally it took only a few minutes of annoyance but now it was taking too long.

"Fine, I guess I'll have to do it myself," Zack grumbled. He dug into his backpack and found a pen and a piece of paper. He plopped down on the ground and took out his math textbook. Flipping to the pages he should've looked at the night before he rested his chin in his hand. It took only a few seconds for his eyes to cross. "Ohh, this is _so_ boring! When am I going to need to know any of this?"

"To figure out you're going to be late in the next five minutes," Max pointed out. She tapped her wrist and nodded towards the clock that hung over the wall.

Zack waved his hand towards her. "Eh, I try not to worry too much about time unless I'm grounded or I'm stuck listening to lectures. Like when I'm in school all day." He rested his chin in his hand and worked on the math problems. The crowds in the hallway started to thin as the seconds passed but he continued to focus on his work.

"Hey guys."

"Hey." Zack looked up as he heard the accented voices and saw Riley and Rhuben waking their way, not seeming to worry about how late they were. "What's going on?" Riley blew her bangs out of her face and looked down at Zack. "Other than another day trying to play catch up."

"Exactly as you said," Max pointed out.

"You still haven't learned to do your homework, mate?" Rhuben tilted her head to the side. "I figured the last time your mum yelled at you would've steered you straight, mate. She yelled loud enough the rest of the Tipton could hear how aggro she was."

"It's a regular occurrence," Cody said.

Zack rolled his eyes and looked for something to throw at his twin but found nothing for him to use. Instead he pouted and stared at the foreign numbers once more. Then he quickly grew bored and watched as Riley and Rhuben moved to their lockers to put their books away. Zack leaned to the side and looked up at Riley with a warm smile.

"Hey Sweet Thang," he greeted her.

"No," she said simply.

"I didn't even ask you anything."

"I haven't been here long, but I already know when you want something. And the answer's 'no'."

"You don't even know what I want."

"A date?"

Zack's smile widened. "Sure! When can I pick you up?"

"Once you get your driver's license, boofhead." She closed her locker door, the force of the wind inside being pushed out to blow her bangs out of her face. Zack frowned seeing the purple hue that encircled her right eye.

He reached out and poked her on the ankle with his pen. Causing her to turn and look down at him with disdain. "What happened to your eye?"

"I ran into a door," she replied. Her eyes shifted as the bell rang and she pulled her backpack up over her shoulder.

Zack groaned lightly and tilted his head back, resting it on the wall behind him. He had only two options; 1) be late for class and finish his work or 2) get to class on time and get detention for not having his work again. All in all he probably had a really big chance of getting detention with either option and his mother did say if she heard he had another detention he'd be grounded for the rest of his life. If there was one thing his mom took seriously—other than her love of George Clooney—it was groundings.

Letting out a long breath Zack focused as hard as he could on the math homework, ignoring the hallways as they became silent, the sound of closing doors up and down the hallway. After a few minutes he could hear the muffled voices of teachers as they started teaching.

He didn't move from his spot until he finished the work to the best of his abilities—which in his opinion still wasn't that great—and headed off to class. He made it, peering inside the window on the door to see Mr. Forgess standing in the corner of the room rambling about whatever. As he reached out to grab the doorknob Zack remembered something that made his blood run cold.

He had been late to class so many times that Mr. Forgess said he would lock the door once class started and wouldn't be let in. And if he missed class again he'd be taken to the principal's office. And the principal had said if he was there one more time for missing class he'd not only have detention but he'd be prohibited of playing on the soccer team for a week. And there were some very important games coming up that week and the next.

He couldn't miss practice let alone the games.

And another detention was….enough to ruin a lot of things in his life.

Pressing his back against the door, Zack shuffled his body aside so that Mr. Forgess didn't see him and continued to look into the classroom. He willed for one of his friends to look up but Max was listening intently to what Mr. Forgess was saying, Rhuben had her head turned towards her books, Bob was staring hard at Mr. Forgess making sure he understood what was being said, and Riley had her chin in her hand, tapping her pen against her book.

Cody and Tapeworm were in the advanced math class and even if they weren't neither of them would help him. They would've been too busy teaching the class themselves.

Reaching up, Zack tapped his finger against the glass, hoping the sound was loud enough to get one of his friend's attention. Still they listened to Mr. Forgess as he continued to slowly move around the room. Zack twisted his mouth to the side, eyes shifting back and forth as he formulated a plan. He reached into his pocket and pulled out his phone, composing a text.

 **Zack:** You have to help me.

Pressing 'SEND' Zack looked through the window and watched as Riley subtly slid lower into her seat. She reached into the lower pocket of her black cargo shorts and pulled out her cell phone to read it. Her eyebrows rose and she glanced up at the window, catching his eye before sending a text back to him.

 **Riley:** Forget it. One day without your aggro breathing down my neck is a God send.

He rolled his eyes and texted back.

 **Zack:** Mr. Forgess said he'd lock the classroom door and wouldn't let anyone in. I can't get detention for this. I actually finished the homework. I need to get into the room.

 **Riley:** That's your problem not mine.

Zack let out a low growl and started to type again but his phone buzzed in his hand. She had texted again.

 **Riley:** But I'll help you out if you'll do something for me.

 **Zack:** I already told you I'd pick you up at 8. ;) Just choose the time and place and I'll make sure that we have a really good time.

 **Riley:** Again, boofhead, I'll have to pass. I'll let you know when I want to cash in on that favor. But you owe me.

 **Zack:** You must really like me if you agreed to help me so fast.

 **Riley:** No, I'm just tired of you pathetically begging for help. It gets old fast, mate. Hold on a few minutes.

Zack watched as Riley put her phone back in her pocket and sat at her desk for a few more minutes. Then she slowly got out of her seat and made her way to the door with a few quick strides. Quietly, she grabbed the down knob and turned it all the way before pulling the door open, minimizing the creaking of the hinges.

"Than—" Zack started to whisper but Riley stuck her hand out and slapped it over his mouth, eyes flashing.

She brought her other hand up to her lips then placed it atop his head, forcing him to his knees on the floor. She took a step back and allowed him enough space to crawl on the ground into the classroom. He looked up and saw some of his classmates smiling down at him, shaking their heads, chuckling at his antics.

"Miss. Jackson, what are you doing?"

Zack looked up, continuing to stay crouched on the ground while she turned and closed the door behind her. Even from where he was sitting he could see her eye widen innocently. "I thought I saw someone at the door, yeah? I'm sorry; I didn't mean to interrupt your thrilling class."

Zack snickered then quickly brought his hand up to keep his laughter from being heard. He leaned to the side and looked between the seats to make sure Mr. Forgess wasn't looking his way. But he waited for Riley to move back to her seat, giving Zack enough time to carefully maneuver his way around the back of the classroom to make it to his seat.

Max looked over at him and smiled, shaking her head.

He smiled back at her and spider walked his way to his seat. Carefully Zack pulled his backpack off and set it by his desk then got off the floor, easing himself into his seat. Riley sat down in hers in front of him. As she did so her phone fell out of her pocket and clattered to the floor.

Zack and Riley leaned over at the same time to see it and the movement must've caught Mr. Forgess's attention for he turned and stared at Zack for a long moment. He smiled back, lacing his hands together to seem as innocent as possible. Around him he could hear his classmates starting to laugh under their breath. He kept his eyes on Mr. Forgess as he reached out with his foot and placed it atop Riley's phone, pulling it back towards him.

"Zack?" Mr. Forgess asked.

"Yes?" Zack replied.

"Were you…have you been…you weren't just here were you?"

Zack tried to look as offended as possible. "I've been sitting here listening to your fantastic lecture on…on…" he stumbled, hoping the words would come to him. Rhuben, who was sitting to his right, whispered, "order of operations," out of the side of her mouth. "The order of operations," he repeated.

Mr. Forgess continued to look at him suspiciously. Then he placed his textbook on his desk and looked from Zack to the front door over and over again. "But…I could've sworn…" he rubbed the back of his head and Zack could see he was starting to talk to himself. "You weren't there."

"Are you sure you didn't just see Cody walking by the door?" Zack slowly shifted Riley's phone to the top of his left foot and slowly lifted it up so that he could grab it with his hand. "We're identical twins we get confused for each other all the time."

Mr. Forgess looked at him one last time and picked up his textbook. He shook his head and went right back to teaching the lesson plan for that day. Zack flipped open to the correct page in his book and put a pen in the correct place. Then he took Riley's phone and pushed it against her back.

Riley turned her head to the side so that she kept an eye on Mr. Forgess but could speak to Zack as well. "What?" she whispered.

"Your phone," he replied. Riley stretched her hand back and he slapped it into her palm. As she moved to pull her hand away Zack tightened his grasp on her hand. He leaned forward a little, placing his mouth closer to her ear as he lowered his voice to a whisper. "Do I still owe you or is this thanks enough?"

"Oh, you still owe me. I think sneaking you in here and making sure you didn't ruin your school record any further deserves a pretty big favor."

"If you say so, Sweet Thang. As long as you can keep me around, right?"

"Right," Riley said sarcastically. Finally, she pulled her hand away from his and moved her phone to her pocket. "By the way, you suck at whispering." She looked away as Mr. Forgess turned their way, his eyes landing on Zack.

"Mr. Martin, is there something you'd like to share with the class?"

Zack smiled innocently. "No. Not at all."


	16. 16: Taking a Walk

**16: Taking a walk**

 **Age: 16**

 **A/N: UA, like 'Help Me, Save Me' and 'Save Me From Myself'.**

* * *

Shoving her hands into the pockets of her windbreaker, Riley listened as Cody explained everything he knew about the historic buildings she and her friends passed as they walked through downtown Boston on their way to the restaurant they would be stopping at for dinner. That is, when he wasn't being interrupted by Bailey, who was doing her best to show off how much she knew about the buildings either.

And she thought it was funny to watch her own siblings fight. But two people who weren't related and were doing their absolute best to one-up each other was even funnier. Normally she would've added in on the light teasing her friends were throwing their way of being the absolute biggest nerds they'd ever seen. But that day she couldn't pay much attention to it. Her mind wasn't in Boston.

It was 16,230 kilometers away, actually.

"Are you okay, Ri-bread?" Riley turned her head to find that Patrick had moved up next to her and was now peering at her quietly. She chuckled to herself as his voice cracked on his question, causing him to blush.

"I'm fine, Pattycakes," she replied. Then she looked down at his side and her eyebrows came together. "Weren't you watching Syd?"

"Oh. He got tired of me holding onto his shirt collar to make sure he didn't go running into every candy store we passed." Patrick tilted his head back and Riley followed his gaze to find Noah was now holding Sydney on his back, holding a tight grasp on his legs to make sure he didn't get away. As Sydney continued to kick him in his sides, trying to turn him into the next candy store they walked by.

Zack, however, noticed it as well and came to a stop, causing Max to walk into him as well. She had to lift up her hand, which was held tightly in Zack's, to make sure the sudden stop didn't jerk their arms.

"I should've known," She remarked. "The only thing he loves more than life itself is junk food."

"No, I love you, too," Zack said. But his voice was a low mumble as he turned to press his nose against the glass. His breath fogged the window, nose pressed up against the glass. "But come on, candy is candy. It's the best thing life has ever given us."

Cody crossed his arms. "You're telling me it's better than the seven wonders of the world?"

"Better than Niagra falls?" Tapeworm added.

"Better than the cow pie pile in the center of Kettlecorn shaped _exactly_ like George Washington?" Bailey asked. All eyes turned her way and she twisted her fingers together. "It's one of Kettlecorn's natural wonders," she explained. "Can you imagine the size of the cow that laid that pie? When it snows in the winter we use it as a hill to sled down."

"That can't turn out any better than the way I'm thinking it would," Crystal said slowly.

"Oh no, it was really fun! Up until you fell off and the snow started to turn brown, _then_ you would have a problem."

"Eh, it's a little better."

"Come on, I've got money burning a hole in my pocket and I plan on filling it up with something sweet." Zack turned and started to pull Max into the candy store. "I need to celebrate the fact that I managed to—"

"—Get your hundredth detention in a week?" Cody guessed.

Zack smirked back at him. "No, make it this far in life with you as my brother."

"Can you ever go a _second_ without insulting each other?" Rhuben asked, scratching the back of her head. She rolled her eyes. "I don't know about you two, but it gets really boring after a while."

"I wouldn't say so," Cody replied. "I think it's helped me expand my vocabulary to make sure that Zack doesn't know if I'm complimenting him or not." He paused. "Actually, I don't know if he knows what 'compliment' means either."

"Considering how many times dad's drilled into my head that I need to compliment every girl I think I know what it means," Zack defended himself. He looked surprised as Max glared and dropped his hand, walking into the candy shop.

Tapeworm watched her go for a second, and then glanced at Zack, before following her into the store. "What?" Zack threw his hands into the air. "Isn't that supposed to be a good thing?"

"It is, but then it gets to be a bit iffy when you're actually in a relationship," Bailey pointed out diplomatically.

He continued to look confused and Riley lifted her gaze towards the sky. Couldn't there by one day when they didn't all start talking about relationships and what was going wrong and right in them? Sometimes it as better for everyone to mind their own business and just deal with it by themselves. Only when it got to the very last moment of redemption should other people get into it.

Then again maybe that's what the problem with her latest relationship was. That they didn't have a lot of time to really talk to each other, not as much as they used to. Calls remained unreturned as they tried to find time. Maybe that was the problem, too. Trying to find time and not having it. Not making enough time. Maybe not thinking how the other person felt.

A lump formed in Riley's throat before she registered it happening. And she worked hard to ignore it, to push it down. Yet it stayed there and she could fell herself starting to tear up. Maybe coming to hang out so soon afterwards was a bad idea; but hanging out with her friends, her family, was supposed to be a distraction.

Patrick peered at her face then grabbed onto her arm. "C'mon, sis, I'll buy you whatever you want. But this'll be the only time I do it, I'm not _that_ nice."

"I can vouch for that," Noah remarked, his voice almost a mumble.

Patrick reached out and flicked Noah in the ear, causing Noah to reach out and shove him in response. Riley chuckled and grabbed onto their shoulders, turning them towards the door of the store and pushed them towards it. She knew they were just trying to make her laugh, to make her feel a little bit better. Their hearts certainly were in the right place but she just wasn't feeling it that day.

 _Just because you're hurting doesn't mean you want to ruin the day for everyone else,_ she reminded herself. And as much of Zack's managing to cram his feet into his mouth was entertaining to her, focusing on the negative that day was probably going to wear down her defenses quicker than she wanted.

Riley followed her friends into the store, glancing over at Zack as he moved up to Max's side and immediately launched into a low-toned conversation. She tilted her head to the side as she looked over the rows and rows of brightly colored packages of candy from all over the world. Sydney and Aaron then ran by her, with Crystal calling after them to 'be careful or else we'd have to pay for this entire store' barreling over to Noah.

"Noah, Noah, buy us these," Sydney said, waving a band of candy over his head. He turned to his cousin Aaron, who stood quietly beside him sightless eyes turned in his cousin's direction, and grabbed the bag that was in his hand. "Buy us these!"

"Why can't you buy it?" Noah asked, eyes widening in bewilderment at the sudden bum rush. Then he regarded his little brother with a suspicious glance. "What'd you spend all of your money on?"

"Candy," Aaron and Sydney replied in unison.

"Oy."

Riley smiled and moved over to the section of the store that held chocolate. That was supposed to make people feel better right? In her case eating a lot of chocolate usually did but this time she didn't even want that. It was strange, really. Nothing else had made her feel so empty before. Not even the last few times she had gone through it. This one was worse; there was a lot more time invested in it.

She looked through the different candy bars in front of her, wondering which one was more likely to help. She looked over as Rhuben came up to her side, arms filled with packages of Reese's Peanut Butter Cups. "Uh-oh, you're looking at the King size bars. That's not good."

"Oh come on, you know I love chocolate," Riley defended herself.

"You like any kind of candy, sis, but that's not the king size bars. The last time you went through that many king size bars you couldn't look at chocolate for weeks without feeling sick. And that was when Rugby died." She tilted her head to the side. "Considering how this went…"

"And by 'this' you mean Nic breaking up with me for absolutely no reason at all and through a text I think that deserves everything short of murder," Riley said. The corner of her mouth came up in a small smile. "I'm kidding."

"I know."

"I know you know. But the last time Cody and Tapeworm overheard me saying something like that they actually sat down and had an intervention with me. And I was talking about how I was going to kill Patrick and Noah for going through my stuff."

The concern was there, which was nice, and she couldn't help but take things a little further for her own source of entertainment and pretend with Max's, Rhuben's, Crystal's, and Zack's help that she was soon planning their demise. They looked at everyone funny for at least a month before they realized a prank was being played on them. But hearing Cody's loud, girlish shrieks was entertainment fodder for as long as it lasted.

"Yeah, but that was funny," Patrick commented, eyeing the candy Riley was looking at. "Being broken up with isn't. C'mon, let me buy you something."

"I don't want you to buy me anything, Pat, knock it off!" Riley said. At his frown her face softened and she added, "But if you insist, it's going to be Maccas, not a bunch of candy." With that, she picked up a large sized Hershey's and Almond bar off of the rack.

"And I was going to share my Peanut Butter cups with you," Rhuben declared, holding her candy tighter to her chest.

"It's not my fault you're allergic to almonds and we both know you'd beat my fingers with a bloody sledgehammer before coming near your candy, sis."

She smiled and laughed, walking up to the register to buy her candy. She plunked it onto the counter and pulled out her wallet to pay for it. Then blinked rapidly when a box of Zabba Babbas and a licorice chain was placed on the counter.

"D'you mind getting this for me? I'm sort of running low on cash," Zack commented.

"Mm, from buying so much from the candy counter to get Maddie's attention, yeah?" She guessed. "And how's that going for ya?"

"About as well as expected considering she's dating your brother," Zack added, a low growl to his voice. Riley turned a glare to him and he quickly held up his hands. "Not that there's anything wrong with it. Julius is a cool guy. He's a great person."

"Thank you." With that, Riley reached up and pushed his candy aside. "And, no, I'm not going to pay for your food."

"Please? I'll be your best friend."

"Will you settle for being my nuisance?"

Zack blinked. "I could if I knew what that meant." He tilted his head to the side, squeezing one eye shut. "Though considering how many times my mom, dad, and teachers have said it, it's probably not a good thing." Riley started to laugh and motioned for the cashier to ring up all of their things. "Thank you. I'll pay you back."

"Like that's ever going to happen. Money is your first love and nothing will get in the way of that. It actually makes me worried what's going to happen once you start making real money of your own."

"Yeah, yeah, I might end up in jail, blah, blah, blah, I've heard it all before." He looked at her funny. "What's up? Normally you can come up with about one hundred better insults that actually makes me think you don't like me."

Reaching up, Riley took the bag of candy from the cashier's hand and her change. Then she pouted. "Aw, I didn't mean to make you feel that way, mate. I wanted to make sure you knew hat I don't like you." She turned and swung his bag of candy into him. "I guess I'm not doing a good job."

"You're getting there, but I don't think that had as much 'oomph' as usual."

"You're such a boofhead."

"There you go!"

Riley found herself laughing again. Once everyone finished gathering their assortment of goodies they were back out on the street walking to the restaurant. Riley only made it a few steps before a thought struck her. Eyes narrowing, she turned to Zack who was walking beside her, whistling to himself and looking up towards the sky. (When he wasn't making a face or rolling his eyes at Cody's exuberant knowledge of Boston).

"Cody told you didn't he?" She asked.

Zack's nose wrinkled as he turned to her. "What are you talking about?"

"Please don't insult me, Zack. Cody is terrible at keeping secrets. I mean, I love him, but you can break him just by looking at him funny." Riley reached up and used both hands to push her hair out of her face. Then she rested them on her neck. "Which explains why he's scared of me half the time."

"Cody's scared of his own shadow, that's not something that should bother you that much."

For someone whose biggest insecurity was her anger, her short-temper, her want to be liked and not judged by her appearance? Yeah, that was something she was working hard not to worry about it. But by having people consistently call her 'mean' or make fun of little things that had managed to make her fly off the handle hurt more than she would ever allow them to see.

"But, yeah, Cody did tell me," Zack continued. "Why didn't _you_ tell me?"

She snorted. "Why would I ever tell you if my boyfriend broke up with me?"

Zack gave her a 'duh' look. Actually he looked a little offended. "Because it sucks. No one likes being broken up with. And anyone who decides to break up with you has to be one of the dumbest people on the face of the planet."

Riley glanced ahead of them to see Max and Tapeworm speaking rapidly to each other about… _something_. Then she looked at Zack, who didn't seem so worried about it. Was there anything to worry about really? Max and Tapeworm had been best friends, long before Zack, Cody, the Jackson, the Mannings, or Bailey had moved to Boston. And their friendship continued to stay strong despite everyone else that had continued to add to their group of friends.

"That's what everyone says," She replied. Then a long sigh escaped her lips. "I reckon I'm not even mad at him. I'm just…upset. The text he sent…he didn't give a reason for the breakup but I've known the bloke for a long time and I know it's because of the distance."

"How long have you known each other?"

"Since we were kids."

"I didn't know you were even dating."

"Again, why would I tell you that? It seems to me like you've got enough problems on your hands at the moment." She nodded up to Max. "I don't know what you're freaking out about. I actually think you get turned on by arguing so much considering how many times you've broken up and gotten back together. I wouldn't worry; you're going to get married anyway."

"You really think we're going to get married?" Zack didn't look convinced.

"I'd honestly be surprised if you didn't." She raised and lowered her right shoulder in a shrug. "Look, you guys have been dating for, like, three years now. Us sheilas, we talk about it all the time. We've already figured out the venue, how many people would go, the gifts we'd give, the theme, the colors…of course this is all depending on how much you want to spend on it."

"Considering you have it all figured out already it seems like all I have to do is just show up."

"Yeah, pretty much."

Zack laughed. He started to say something else then stopped, shaking his head. It must not have been important as he didn't push the topic any further. The two continued to walk in silence. Riley blinked in surprise as a brightly colored candy was shoved in her face. Reaching up her hand, Riley shoved Zack's away from her face.

"No thanks, mate," She said quickly.

"What? You love these things."

"Yeah, usually I do."

"So what's wrong now?"

"I don't know where your hand has been."

Zack made a show of inspecting it then wiped it on the side of his jeans. He gave an easy going shrug. "Fine. Then that means I get all of this candy to myself. You might've paid for them but good luck getting any of it back." He sniffed. "But I guess you'd rather not act like I'm your friend because you don't like me."

"I like you," Riley replied. It came out sort of absentmindedly as she was only half listening to his spiel. Then there was a strange tension in the air and she focused on what it was that he said. "As a person," she quickly clarified. "I like you just fine as a person."

He could've teased her about it. Pushed the conversation topic further. Gone as far as to tease her to the point she had to threaten bodily harm. Instead he smiled and made himself busy with opening one of his pieces of candy.

"Okay," he replied.

And that was it.

And she wanted to do nothing more than smack him for it.

But at least she was feeling a little better.


	17. 17: Baking

**17: Cooking/Baking**

 **Age: 21**

* * *

Cody hummed to himself as he stood at the counter, flicking his wrist back and forth as he whisked a pale yellow concoction in a large blue bowl.

Sitting at the other end of the counter, Zack's eyebrows lowered. He let out a low breath, squinting. He tried to start reading again and found he was looking at the same sentence over and over again. That humming was getting on his nerves and clearly Cody wasn't going to stop anytime soon. Zack pressed his hands against his ears, but it seemed that Cody's humming continued to get louder.

"Do you have to do that?" He asked, finally lifting his head.

Cody turned to Zack with a pleasant smile on his face. Almost as if he was doing it on purpose. As far as he knew that was exactly what was going on. "Hm? Do what?" Zack tilted his head. Cody's smile widened. "Oh, this humming? Yeah, I have to do it."

"Why?"

"Other than having a beautiful singing voice inherited by our mother I've found that singing to my ingredients makes sure that they come out as fluffy an delicious as possible," Cody said.

Zack stared at him for a long moment. "Is that a thing? Or are you as weird as I originally thought."

"It's like people singing to their plants or their pets. Music has therapeutic properties that not many people would originally think. And since I've won the baking contest at the Tipton for the past four years, I think I know what I'm talking about."

Zack was tempted to make fun of him for it, to mock him in a high-pitched voice, to do pick up one of the whisks he had discarded and fling whatever was in the bowl all over him. Instead, he focused his attention on his textbook once more. With an exam coming up soon he needed to be sure to have a good grade.

He couldn't fail his last year of college. All of his hard work would've been wasted and he would've been very bitter. Especially after Cody had deferred a year of school to go along with him. He surely would've been disappointed if things went downhill that quickly.

Then again, he could only read about the history of television before his brain went numb and his attention span went flying out the window. Why did he care about the history of television? All he wanted to do was talk about his favorite shows and why others were good or bad. Even then that wasn't as interesting as watching as much of it as he could. His record so far was nearly 24 hours and that was when he was supposed to have been working on a paper.

Of course the paper ended up being rushed the few hours before it was due and he could've done better. But at the time it helped so that he was able to at least go towards the topic in a new direction.

Zack managed to get halfway through the chapter before Cody's humming started to get on her nerves again. "Would you stop?!"

Cody continued to stir the contents of another bowl, of which Zack wasn't sure where he retrieved it. "Zack, why don't you just take a break? You've been studying for hours."

"I'm sorry; did those words really come out of _your_ mouth? From the guy who was born reading a book?" Zack sneered. Then he sighed heavily and dog-eared his page, causing Cody to let out a muffled sound that resembled a painful squeak, and closed the book with a loud thump. Leaning back in his seat, he rubbed his eyes. "I need to get a good grade on this test."

"I've told you before, hours of studying doesn't work as much as burst of studying and scheduled breaks do. All you're going to do is burn yourself out and make yourself hate the material you're studying." At least Cody had the decency not to sound too preachy about it. If he did, Zack had the right mind to pick up the bowl he was mixing and dump it over his head.

Instead, Zack leaned forward and rested his elbows on the counter and placed his face in his hands. He yawned and rubbed his eyes then blinked them open. His eyes narrowed as he watched Cody continue to turn through a cook book that sat at his side. "What are you doing?"

"I'm baking a dessert that has multiple layers and frosting keeping each layer together before encompassing the entire structure. Or as most people call it, a cake." Cody set the mixing bowl down and leaned towards Zack with a smirk. "You know that thing that we get to share for our birthday but you eat the entire thing."

Zack smirked back at Cody. "You're the one who takes twenty minutes to eat a damn piece of cake."

"I'm savoring each bite!"

"By measuring how many of the ingredients you get on your fork each bit? Who _does_ that?"

"People who want a good ratio of flavors!"

The two looked over as the door to their apartment opened and Riley and Rhuben Jackson walked in along with their cousin Crystal Manning, who had her phone pressed to her ear. As they walked in Crystal moved her phone away from her ear and asked, "Geez, do you two ever stop fighting?"

"No, we find it too much fun," Zack said. That was honest answer. Most of the time he annoyed Cody just because he knew he could get under his sin as easily as Cody could get under his. Sometimes while in the middle of insulting each other they would burst out laughing at how ridiculous they sounded. "Who's she talking to?"

"Uncle Christian," Rhuben replied, brushing her purple stand of hair out of her eyes. She walked over to Cody and looped her arm around his waist. He leaned in and gave her a kiss on the side of the head. "Something about being on our best behavior, blah, blah, blah."

"Basically, he doesn't want to find out that the entire city burned down while we were here," Riley added. She walked over to Zack as he pushed back his seat a little bit, and sat down on his lap, wapping her arm around his shoulders. "What's going on?"

"Other than Cody being as annoying as usual?" He asked his girlfriend, causing her to chuckle.

"Sorry, mate, but I don't think he can be as annoying as you can," she said. Zack rolled his eyes. Riley's eyes roved over the bowls that were spread out over the counter. "Where you making a cake?" Then she sat up straight. "Oh, it's Carey's birthday isn't it? I forgot to get her a gift."

Zack frowned. "It's not Mom's birthday."

All eyes turned towards him but no one said a thing. Cody brought up his wrist to look at his watch, Rhuben rubbed the back of her neck, Crystal made a sound as if she were clearing her throat, and Riley simply looked at him with a blank expression on her face.

Right.

It _was_ her birthday.

"Huh, that explains those weird hints that Mom was trying to drop," he remarked. Zack rubbed his chin. "I was wondering why she kept saying she wished she had my phone the last time she visited. I was expecting her to have figured out a reason to ground me and take it for herself."

"You're in college, Zack, she can't ground you," Crystal pointed out. She shook her head, hair moving over her arm. She used her free hand to move it then glanced down at her cell phone. Her eyes widened when she realized she was still on the phone with her father and she placed it against her ear. "Sorry, Daddy." She sat down on the couch, pressing her phone back to her ear.

Zack drummed his fingertips atop the counter. "Say, buddy, you wouldn't happen to—"

"—I'm not putting your name on any of this cake or any of the present I got Mom unless you bake half of it," Cody said firmly. Zack frowned. Then he tried the puppy dog eyes. And sticking out his lower lip. But Cody continued to stare at him, unfazed by his antic. "Seriously, if those don't work on her," he pointed to Riley, "Then it's not going to work on me."

"Who says it doesn't?" Zack defended himself. He squeezed Riley's thigh to keep her quiet.

"My baby brother can't even get it to work on me anymore, I'm immune."

Too late.

Zack leaned back and narrowed his eyes at her. "You couldn't back me up?"

"Only because Cody knows you too well." She leaned in and gave him a kiss. "And because it really doesn't work, yeah?"

Rhuben and Cody laughed. Zack's upper lip curled and he reached over to take Cody's cook book. He flipped a few pages, his lip curling even harder as he did so. "But I don't know how to cook. I don't even know how to make eggs without them turning out crunchy."

"Crunchy?" Rhuben repeated. "Mate, eggs are _never_ supposed to be crunchy. Not unless you leave the shell in there and even then they'd probably become soft."

"Actually, they don't. We tested that theory once before when Mr. Moseby, as a punishment for some prank, made me and Zack work with Chef Paolo. Even _I_ thought Zack could handle cooking eggs."

"No one told me the only time you leave the shell on is when you're making hard boiled eggs," Zack defended himself. He slapped the book shut with a loud thud that made the others jump a little. "It never says it in the instructions."

"Recipes," Riley corrected him.

"It never says you need to crack the eggs."

"Then how do you separate the egg whites from the egg yolks?"

"By _cracking them!_ Are you even listening?"

Cody leaned forward and allowed his forehead to drop onto the counter with a loud thud.

"Careful about those brain cells," Zack called. That's what Cody always said when Zack managed to whack his head against something. And when he did something that made him think too hard about something.

"I can't…I don't…" Cody's voice was muffled against the counter.

Crystal walked over and gently rubbed Cody's back. "It's alright, Cody, we all know that Zack can be difficult sometimes. But the bright side is that we all know how to cook and we all know how to follow a simple recipe, so we can make sure that Zack at least doesn't burn your apartment down."

Zack held up a finger. "You seem to be forgetting that I was the best member of our Wilderness Scouts troop. I understand how to make a fire. _And_ I can make dehydrated food very well. It's just everything else that's the problem." He looked his brother in the eye. "Alright, I'll make the next part of the cake and then you can put my name on the cake and the card. I mean, how hard can it be?"

"Okay," Cody said after a second. "But once you _can't_ do it, you have to admit that cooking is a lot harder than you think _and_ you'll do a better job of sharing the chores around here. I'm tired of it being your turn to make dinner and you just order out."

Zack pressed his lips together. "Fine."

He was never one to back away from a challenge.

But he had a bit of an ulterior motive.

Zack took an empty bowl that was sitting in the sink, where Cody had placed it after cleaning up as he went, and placed it on the counter. Opening up the recipe book one more time Zack looked at the first instruction or gathering the ingredients together.

Sugar.

Flour.

Water.

Butter.

Everything that had different quantities that needed to go into the cake. All the while he conversed with the others. "So what are you guys doing once our graduation is over? Are you going to stick around in New York for a while?"

"Actually, Moose and I are going to Texas right after," Crystal explained. She twisted her fingers together as she leaned against the counter. "I have a research opportunity out there that Dad said he'd never forgive me for if I didn't at least try it and Moose said a farm is hiring a farm hand down there."

"Yeah, that's the reason why," Rhuben said to her cousin with a roll of her eyes."He came to Boston as a controlling guy and you made him whipped."

"Pun obviously intended," Riley added.

Zack and Cody started to laugh along with them, though Cody's laugh was obviously forced as he looked back and forth between his girlfriend and her cousin. Zack rolled his eyes then motioned to the two girls. "You really have to get over this thing, Cody. If Crys and Rhu can get over the fact that you dated both of them so can you. Not everything revolves around you, you know."

"Nothing is _ever_ about me," Cody pointed out.

"The beauty pageant. The time you went to math camp. When you made all of those cookies for that dentist convention. When you became a sort of life coach. When you were Chef Paolo's pedigree—"

"Protégé," Cody corrected.

"When you weren't good at woodshop, I could go on and on." Zack started to pour a cup of sugar into a mixing bowl, taken from a cup he found in the cabinet, and Riley quickly brought out her hand, stopping him from doing so.

"I know you have a sweet tooth, Z, but no one can handle that," she pointed out.

"Okay. Fine." Zack put half of it in instead. Then he dusted off his hands and gave her a kiss on the cheek. "But only because I get enough sugar from you."

Cody mimed sticking his finger down his throat as Crystal and Rhuben 'aww'd sarcastically. Riley ignored the two and reached up, running her fingers through his hair. "Why do I get the feeling that's prefacing something? You only get like this when you have something to say."

"I can't be nice to my girlfriend?"

"You're nice to me all the time, yeah? And because, boofhead, I've know you long enough to read your mind."

Zack's eyes moved from Riley to the cake ingredients, to Cody, to Crystal and Rhuben, and back to the cake. Then he slowly started to smile. "Then I hope you know what I'm planning to do with this cake and stop me before I do it."

"I'm going to miss you sense of humor when I'm in Texas, Zack," Crystal commented. Then she tilted her head to the side. "Of course I'll be waiting for your mug shot to appear in the news for some sort of wide-scale prank you manage to pull off. But I'm going to miss it."

"What can I say? I can be as charming as the next guy." He shifted his gaze and focused on what the cookbook was telling him, moving swiftly back and forth across the kitchen as he did so. Finally it was ready to go into the oven and he carefully transferred the batter into a cake pan and stuck it in the oven.

Cody leaned over and glanced at the cake as it sat on the shelf. "So far so good. Now all we have to do is taste it."

"And you're going to get that familiar taste of defeat," Zack replied. He placed his open palm over Cody's face and pushed him away. "You must be getting tired of choking on it."

"Ha ha."

"Because I figured at some point I was going to have to learn anyway. And…" Zack took a deep breath. "I was thinking that, after graduation maybe we could move in together somewhere. And it wasn't going to help my case if I didn't know how to cook."

Riley blinked in surprise. "You want to move in together?"

"Yeah. I mean. I love you. You love me, I hope. We've been dating for four years and I'm tired of having a long distance relationship and I really think it could work."

Then Zack's life flashed before his eyes. Or at least in the time it took for Riley to work through what he said, it seemed like it. Honestly, it was probably the quietest he had ever heard her. Cody, Crystal, and Rhuben had given their two cents but Zack tuned them out. Or maybe he died a little on the inside from embarrassment of even thinking about it.

He had never been so embarrassed. Not since that whole ghost in suite 613 thing. And when one of his classmates had stopped by his dorm in freshmen year when he was trying to show Woody something and she thought the two were a couple. That had taken a long time to convince her he wasn't.

Finally, Riley started to speak, giving Zack feeling back in his body.

"I'll move in with you on two…three conditions," Riley said. Zack nodded. "We at least try to compromise of where we're going to live. I need to think about whether or not I can leave home or what you're going to do. Two we have to split the chores evenly because I'm not going to do it all myself. And three,"—Riley stuck her finger into Zack's mixing bowl and licked some of the batter off her thumb. She immediately made a face. "Until I think your cooking won't kill me, I'm good on ordering out."

Zack laughed.


	18. 18: Proposal

**18: Proposal**

 **Age: 22**

* * *

Zack closed his locker and picked up his tool belt in his left hand as he grabbed his ringing phone with his right. He glanced at the screen for a minute then immediately answered it. "Let me guess, you're getting a divorce," he said as a greeting.

Max laughed lightly. "What makes you say that?"

"I was making a joke. Everyone knows you and Tapeworm aren't getting divorced anytime soon. You're, like, the perfect couple. Then again I'm sure a lot of people said the same thing about us in high school." He could hear Tapeworm laughing in the background and figured he was either on speaker or he was that close to listen. "Okay, it's not _that_ funny."

"Considering all we ever really did was fight? It kind of is," Max replied. Though he could hear her smiling as well. "No, that's not true. You made me really good at my comebacks."

"Well, at least I was good for something."

"You were really motivating, too, Zack. I'll give you that. Especially with the different things I wanted to do." She paused. "Mostly because you found some way to benefit from it, too."

"That's the point of life, isn't it?" Zack nodded to his co-worker as he walked out of the locker room and headed across the constructions site to his truck. "So what's up? Normally you only call when there's some sort of a game on and the game isn't until tonight."

"We were wondering if you had the hotel reservations yet? For when we go down to Texas."

"Uh. I think Ri has that covered. You know she wouldn't want to miss her cousin's wedding." Zack paused in his steps. "Oh, I get it. You're making sure that I didn't completely flake out on it or anything, right?"

"No, actually, we wanted to know about the ring that you got."

Now Tapeworm was on the phone and Zack could hear the sound of a roaring crowd in the background. He chuckled. Max's attention certainly had to have been diverted by whatever sporting event she was watching. That was definitely something he was glad hadn't changed about her despite her career changing in a way no one expected.

Who would've thought Max would've quit all of her extracurriculars and dancing and singing to become an event planner? If there was one she knew though, it was how to throw a party. And so far a majority of the time they could all get together for birthdays and holiday was courtesy of Max. Which ended up being a gift of some sort so she wasn't expected to get an _actual_ gift—as she said.

"How'd you know that?" Zack asked. Then he stopped walking and thought hard. "Either my Mom or Cody told you. They can't ever keep a secret. And you _know_ when I told them they got incredibly weepy and excited about it. That's why I don't tell them anything anymore."

"Yeah, Cody told me," Tapeworm said. He laughed lightly. "And it has nothing to do with the fact that he can't keep a secret. If it wasn't him that told me it would've been Patrick, Noah, and Sydney. Or Rhu or Crys. You know it wasn't ever going to be a secret."

"Yeah, I should've kept my mouth shut." Zack then noticed that Tapeworm hadn't mentioned a few people. "Have you talked to Julius or Maddie or Bailey recently?"

"I have. And I think you're safe in thinking that knowing that you plan on proposing Maddie's not going to realize she made a mistake and go running into your arms." Tapeworm sounded sarcastic. Zack couldn't help but smile a little bit.

"Hey, I was young and dumb and very hopeful back then. I don't think that way anymore. Having her as my date for prom was thanks enough." Zack ran a hand through his hair as he reached his truck and opened it, throwing his tool belt and hard hat inside. "And as for the ring I'm on my way to the jewelers to pick it up. I haven't been able to keep it around the house because knowing her she'd find it within a few seconds of cleaning. But you should have pictures blowing up your phone by the time I do propose."

Zack was suddenly struck with a horrifying thought.

What if he got back to the apartment in time to find that Riley already knew about his plans to propose? Chances are it would get to her from everyone else's excitement before he could even do it. _I bet Bailey and Jessica would be the ones to do it,_ Zack thought, palms suddenly sweating. _They always like to talk about this sort of thing. And Bailey always gets excited about weddings and marriages and stuff, she's been dreaming about her own since she was a kid._ At least that's what he barely paid attention to of the times she managed to go off on a tangent bout it.

Like Cody he stopped listening to her after a while because of the tangents she could go on. He wondered how Jessica dealt with it but figured that Janice had been the same way if she didn't have issues with her girlfriend being so open and excitable.

"Look, I have to go or else the jeweler might sell my ring. But I promise I'll send you guys some pictures as soon as I get the chance, okay?"

"No problem."

"Since when do you care about rings?"

"Since I've studied the component that are used to create the jewels within them through some of my studies," Tapeworm replied. He laughed. "Have to make sure you're not being as cheap as you usually are."

"Just because I like to make money doesn't mean I like spending it," Zack pointed out. "Besides, most of my income at this point has been going into this company so I can make sure it gets off the ground."

"I don't know anyone else who has managed to go through college while working their way up through a construction job to eventually start their own company. I don't think there's anything that you really need to worry about."

"Coming from the guy who, along with my brother, has started their own start-up technology company that saw success as soon as it started?"

Zack wasn't jealous at all.

He was really proud of the company that Cody and Tapeworm had managed to get started with relative ease; their studies in school certainly had helped with Tapeworm receiving a degree from MIT and Cody receiving one from NYU. They had been talking about their startup since their sophomore year of school and got it together fairly quickly.

The success they saw was inspiring and Zack hoped they continued to go far. As a matter of fact, all of his friends were doing some really great things. They called to catch up with each other often enough that they couldn't go a day without hearing good news of some sort. Now he'd be the next one with the good news.

If only he could stop sweating over it.

"Okay, so maybe I've now shifted my obsession from hot dogs over to coffee, but I had to pull some really long nights," Tapeworm defended himself. He laughed. "Hey, I've got to go. I need to help Max decorate a cake or something. So I'll talk call you later."

"Let me call you first. Chances are someone's going to ruin the surprise if they call me."

"Alright, talk to you later."

"Later, dude."

Zack hung up and took a deep breath. He dropped his phone into the passenger seat and turned they key in the ignition. Bobbing his head to the classic rock station Zack drove into town and parked in front of a jewelers. He stepped out of the cabin of his truck and made sure to wipe his hands off on the sides of his jeans before going inside. Going right after work might not have been a good idea, but he couldn't wait much longer. Too many people knew and…well, he was excited for it.

"What can I help you with today, sir?" The jeweler behind the counter looked Zack up and down as he approached. Zack could see a quick glimpse of disgust flash over his face and did his best not to roll his eyes. Of course this guy would just base things on his appearance. He probably thought Zack was going to try to rob the store more than anything else.

Zack walked up to the counter and started to press his palms against it, but the jeweler immediately grabbed a rag and buffed the area he was about to put his hands on. "Please don't touch, I just cleaned these counters," he said. He buffed a few more moments then pulled it away and sniffed. Then he gave a tense smile. "Now, what is it I can help you with?"

"I'm here to pick up an engagement ring," Zack explained, sliding his hands into his front pockets. His eyebrows rose as he tried not to smirk. He could see a light of recognition flicker behind the man's eyes. His name had become very well known around the city lately. "The one that's set in silver?"

"Yes, right away Mr. Martin. And I do apologize for my earlier reaction to your appearance…I assume you just got off work."

"Yep, on my way home now."

"And I'm greatly appreciative of the work you've done on the store. Things have been even better with the new contractional design you've worked on, let alone the security system that has been placed." The jeweler quickly turned on his heel and walked to the back of the store.

Zack whistled to himself as he waited for the jeweler to come back. Anxiety started to twist his guts once more. His nerves made it hard for him to concentrate at work that day, so much so that he had to put himself into the office in case there was some sort of an accident. Even then he could hardly do any work his hands were shaking so badly. Now that the time was getting closer he had to fight the urge to throw up.

His eyes roved over the beautiful rings, necklaces, and bracelets that sat in the display cases in front of him. Who would've thought he would ever be in one of the stores.

"Here is your ring sir." The jeweler was back. He pushed a small box forward on the counter. "I took the liberty of shining it once more to be sure it is at its prime to be presented." Zack said his thanks and paid the jeweler with a hastily written check then took the box from him. "Congratulations, I hope the two of you are happy together."

"Thank you," Zack said. He nodded his thanks to the jeweler and quickly left the store, driving home at top speed before he could talk himself out of hesitating. Carefully he took the ring out of the velvet box and slid it into the container of blueprints next to him, replacing the top.

His hands continued to shake.

Why was he so worried anyway? He had been dating his girlfriend for five years by that point, having moved in together over the past year. If they hadn't broken up with each other yet while talking about their future things weren't going to get any worse. So far their conversations about the future had been almost subconscious with a statement of 'when we get married' here or 'once we have kids' there. And he found it was something he truly did want as time went on.

Then came the day where he woke up to Riley sleeping quietly next to him and he knew for sure he wanted no one else and it was the perfect time to propose. Or at least the perfect time to start thinking about it. Things had gone nowhere but uphill since then.

That was a good sign.

Zack walked up to his apartment, pausing for only a second when he heard loud music coming from the other side of the door. That wasn't too weird, he and Riley both shared a love of rock music and she was always singing along to the radio. But not normally at this time of day. Especially not after the time their neighbors had yelled at them for having the music up so loud, only when they were trying to drown out said neighbors by _their_ loud music.

Pushing open the door, Zack watched as Riley slowly turned to him, her hips moving back and forth as she worked a hula-hoop around her body.

"Hey!" She greeted with a bright smile.

"Hey," he replied. Zack kicked off his shoes and slowly walked to her. "What are you doing?"

"Hula-hooping!" The smile still remained on her face.

"I can see that," Zack replied. He laughed lightly. He pointed at her with the blueprint. "I mean, why are you hula-hooping in the middle of the living room?"

"I missed my workout this morning. I had to go into work early. So I figured I would get it done now."

"It's sure making _my_ heart race." Zack laughed when Riley reached out her hand and stopped the hula-hoop then leaned over to use the other one to punch him on the arm. "Hey, I want to show you something."

Now she looked interested. "Does it have to do with that tube you've got in your hand?"

"Yeah, come on." Zack took her hand and walked her into the kitchen where he could spread out the contents of the tube on a bigger table. Once she was standing next to him he popped open one end of the tube and slid the contents out onto the table. He held his breath, hoping the ring wouldn't slide to along with it, relaxing when it didn't. Then he opened the parchment and used the salt and pepper shakers to hold the edges down. "What do you think?"

He studied Riley's face as she leaned forward to look over the blue print. It was of a house that was to be built, four bedroom and three bathrooms, a big basement, enough space in the backyard for whatever wanted to be put there. A two car garage and a long driveway off-set the large front yard.

"You're going to build this?" She asked.

A smile of pride wormed its way onto his face. "Yep! It's the biggest project we have lined up. Just need to make sure the land it's supposed to be built on is enough or else we'd have to buy more land. But otherwise we're going to build it." He paused as she looked over it again. "So, what do you think?"

"I reckon the master bedroom could be a little bigger," she commented, pointing to a corner of the page. "If you take some space from the closet and bathroom then you can put a set of bay windows over here, or just make this entire wall windows, yeah?" she commented.

"Yeah, that's something to think about," Zack replied slowly. He cleared his throat. "So you really like it?"

"Yeah! I can't wait to see the final product, that's the best part," Riley commented.

Zack smirked. "Better than being in an office all day?" He asked her.

Riley rolled her eyes. "I already told you, I don't sit in my office all day. I'm a physical trainer; I'm actually working with people. Not just making up fitness and health plans."

"You're right, you just torture me with all of that healthy crap you make me eat," Zack replied. He ran a hand through his hair. "I'm only twenty-two I think I can handle a bunch of joke food for the next couple of years." He cleared his throat once more, steadying himself. "Anyway, I'm glad you like the look of the house, Ley…because it's going to be ours."

She turned her attention away from the blueprints and onto him. She tilted her head to the side, raven hair falling into her dark blue eyes, prompting her to pull it back over her ear. "What do you mean it's for us, Z?"

"I mean…I've been thinking for a long time to show you how committed I am to us working out. I know over the past couple of years it's been hard with you at school in Australia and me at school in New York and starting up my company and everything. But I want you to know that this"—he motioned between the two of them—"is what I want. And I couldn't think of a better way to prove that than by investing in our future. I want you to be proud of me."

"I _am_ proud of you," Riley insisted.

"I know you are. And I'm grateful you are, I'm grateful for you. And unless Cody managed to make good on his threats and poisoned me, I'm not going anywhere," Zack joked. He tilted his head towards the blueprints. "I want that to be a house we can start a family in."

Riley stood up straight, her face softening. She looked Zack in the eye. She parted her lips, gently licked them and asked, "Did you just propose to me with a blueprint?"

"Yep." He reached over towards the tube and upended it into his hand, dumping out the ring. He turned back to Riley and held it up in his hand. "I love you, Ley and I want to start the rest of our life together. Will you marry me?"

Now Riley's smile rivaled the one she had given him when he first arrived at the apartment. Her eyes shone and Zack was only a little suspicious they were tears. He hadn't seen her get so emotional at times but even now he was starting to become a little afraid of how speechless she was. Finally, she reached out her left hand towards him as she nodded.

"Yes, Zack, I'll marry you."

Zack's hands shook even more as he gently slid the engagement ring onto her finger then pulled her forward to give her a long kiss. When he pulled back he found himself laughing happily.

"What's so funny?" Riley reached up and brushed his hair back from his face.

"Nothing. I just don't know why I was so scared to do this," he admitted. "I mean, you could've said 'no'."

"After all this time I put into this relationship there's no way I'd say no, boofhead," Riley teased. Her nose wrinkled as she smiled teasingly. "I might've made you sweat a little, but I wouldn't have said 'no'."

That was all Zack needed to hear.

"Who would've thought though?" She asked, admiring her ring. "After all these years that I would've gotten married to you?"

Zack wrapped his arms around her and pressed a kiss to her temple. "I always did."

* * *

 **THE END**

* * *

 **A/N:** That was the last one! There were a few more that I had originally planned to do in here but then decided to take them out and put them as their own one-shots. I originally intended for other SLOZAC/SLOD characters to be more important as well as to show more of Riley's family but in the end found that it was better if the focus was more set on Zack and Riley as a whole.

That being said I'll remedy the lack of Patrick, Noah, and Sydney in my other suite life stories. Thanks for reading guys! I really appreciate it.

 **Cheers,**

 **-Riles**


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